One more of the Virgin in Los Angeles, again in the southern part of the city, though I can’t remember where.
Tag Archives: Catholic
LOS ANGELES: “I Who Am Your Mother” …The Virgin of Guadalupe
I’m not Catholic, or any kind of Christian, but years in Mexico formed a soft spot in my heart for the Virgin of Guadalupe, whose day is today: December 12.
She seems to embody all the best of the philosophy of Jesus Christ: tenderness, patience, love, caring for the poor and forgotten.
I also liked how, in a very Protestant way, many Mexicans shaped their own personal relationships with her, far, very often, from the church hierarchy.
These photos are from La Placita in downtown Los Angeles early this morning.
Happy Virgin of Guadalupe Day to one and all!
Filed under Los Angeles, Mexico, Religion, Virgin
RELIGION: Protestants no longer the majority
Fascinating findings by the Pew Forum on Religious & Public Life that Protestants no longer make up a majority
of the United States.
Many folks are religious but unaffiliated with any denomination.
As it turns out, I’m in the midst of a story about many Oaxacan Indians, from a Catholicism in their native towns that resembles something from 16th Century Spain, who have converted to various Protestant denominations here in the United States.
This is something I also found in the parts of Baja California where many Oaxacans also migrated. The Valley of San Quintin, where thousands of Oaxacans have come for farmwork, is studded with storefront churches: Pentecostal, Baptist, Jehovah’s Witness and others.
Always seemed to me that converting to Protestant denominations was part of the voyage out of the mountains of Oaxaca, Chiapas and other similarly distant places — a lifting of the blinders, in a sense. Not everyone goes through this, and a lot find other ways to come out of the Old World. But a good many bring clarity to their New World through a Protestant lens.
After all, they come from villages where the priest would visit and everyone would have to take off their hats and cast their eyes to the ground. Where people were prohibited from reading the Bible, but virtually required to participate in mass and annual religious festivals, which often involved heavy drinking.
