Easter in Madrid - 2014
From Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday, locally known as Semana Santa (Holy Week), Easter is the most important celebration in Spain. My husband Lamb and I sat in the third row pew of the beautiful, 16th century Baroque Church of San Isidro el Real in the center of Madrid, attending Easter sunrise service.
I tried to concentrate as the Roman Catholic priest commemorated the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus Christ, but in reality my thoughts drifted to traditional Easter celebrations back home in Fullerton, California. There after church family and friends feasted on ham and ambrosia, and laughing children searched for hidden eggs to add to the Cadbury chocolates tucked inside their Easter baskets.
Sacred music brought me back to the present in Spain and wafted through the church. As we departed through the immense carved doors, and down the wide steps we passed through a group of forty men who patiently stood beside a massive flat platform. The men were carbon copies of each other with shiny black hair, crisp white shirts, black slacks and shined shoes.
As the last churchgoer left, the atmosphere changed. Lamb and I joined the throng of spectators that had gathered along the street. The men disappeared inside the church. The only sound was the soft pounding of unseen bass drums.
It felt like an hour had passed. The doors opened. Men emerged on their knees. They carried a life-size image of Jesus on their shoulders, and struggled to clear the doorway. Faces sweating, they crawled inch-by-inch to the first landing, where they set down the 800 pound icon. The men stood, hoisted it to their shoulders once more, and placed it on the platform to thunderous clapping from the onlookers.
In unison, the men re-entered the church. Another hour passed. On their knees, with the statue of the Virgin Mary carved out of cedar and juniper resting on their shoulders, they inched their way through the doors, down the steps and placed their burden on to the platform.
It was now near noon. Women in elegant scalloped Mantilla lace veils in a variety of colors appeared to wipe brows, knot black silk ties around the necks of the men, to help them slip into their black robes with red rope sashes. The men pulled on crisp white gloves. The women placed flowers, crosses, and embroidered shawls around the sculpted figures of Mary and Jesus, called pasos.
The San Isidro brotherhood was ready to take part in a religious procession of Semana Santa – one of many throughout Madrid. Forty costaleros, twenty on each side of the now 2,600 pound platform, hoisted the float to their necks and shoulders. We heard the vibrating sound of snare drums. We felt the parade of
drummers before we saw them, as we followed the procession from Calle de Toledo onto Calle Magdalena toward the Plaza Mayor.
Crowds swelled along the parade route. A middle-aged woman holding a crucifix wept. A mother shushed her crying baby. A man heaved a toddler onto his shoulders. A lone woman stood on a balcony, grasping a filigree iron railing, and sang. We couldn’t hear her for the noise of the crowd, and the drums and trumpets that accompanied the procession.
The aroma of frankincense permeated the air. Wisps of smoke trailed upward from swinging censers. Odors of traditional dishes were interspersed with the frankincense.
Lamb and I slipped into a tavern for shrimp with chili peppers in a pool of garlic, parsley, salt, and olive oil. We finished the tapas with a torreja, a sweet treat made using bread soaked in milk with cinnamon, fried, and sprinkled with sugar.
The life-size crucified Jesus passed. Time stood still as Lamb and I considered the unique age-old tradition of celebrating Easter Sunday in Madrid.
We agreed that it was important, as we observe and celebrate Easter, to bring the joy of the Resurrection into everyday life – whether traveling in Madrid or here at home in Fullerton.
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