Sometimes it’s hard to pay attention

It’s Hard to pay attention in la iglesia (church) to be specific. Mom, you will be happy to hear that Jenny and I have been good Catholics here and we have been going to the local service on Sundays. It is sometimes very hard to pay attention though. Of course the obvious reason is that it is all in Spanish and I easily get lost, especially during the homily, but there is a lot more going on there than just a guy rattling off God’s message in Nicañol. First of all it seems like the women of the village use church as their forum for the weekly breast feeding contest. I don’t think there is a week that goes by where less than 7 or 8 women breast feed during mass. I am not just talking infants here either, there are kids that barely fit in mom’s lap who are chowing down. Also, last time I checked, it wasn’t necessary to breast feed your baby more than once an hour, but some of the women will go a few rounds during one service. The only explanation that I could come up with is that it must be the weekly contest.

The breast feeding is a little weird and I guess just a cultural difference, but all in all not that distracting. What is distracting is what some of the kids do during mass. So I know that sometimes there is a stray kid or two back home at church that gets loose and makes a dash up the aisle, but that is more the exception than the rule. In Sabana Grande it seems like everyone just lets their kids have free roam around the church. Most people just focus right on the service as if there is nothing going on, unless one of them jumps in their lap. The community here is so small and close knit that all the kids feel comfortable with everyone. Sometimes I can’t tell who the parents are because the kids have bounced between so many laps. The other week there was this one little boy that must have been about 2 ½ was bouncing between his grandmother in the seat directly in front of me and his family, a few aisles back. He started off by just switching back and forth like 10 times during the readings. Then he returned once with a small bag of chips that was torn open so carelessly that it was torn all down the middle and the chips were precariously balancing in a little pocket. I couldn’t take my eyes off of it, just waiting for the chips to spill all over the floor. Sure enough he crashed into grandma’s lap and left a pile of chips in her skirt with out her knowing. Grandma noticed the chips in her lap and was thoroughly ticked about it, then gathered them up as carefully as possible and put them back into his broken bag and sent him on his way. Just as I was thinking what was going to happen to all the chips on the floor underneath the seat and in the aisle, a stray dog roamed in and took care of the mess for us—how convenient. Then a few minutes later the boy returned, this time chewing something that I figured was gum. Then grandma suddenly got really mad and upset and tried to wrestle the gum out of his mouth. Then a lady one aisle ahead joined in and shoved her finger in his mouth. The little rascal wiggled free and ran away laughing, still chewing the gum. I then realized why they were so upset; none of them had given him gum. He must have found it on the floor or stuck to the bottom of another seat. At this point I just couldn’t contain myself and I started laughing, which got Jenny laughing and it took all I had to keep quiet and not draw attention. Imagine all that this one boy was doing, then add 3 or 4 other kids acting the same in a small church of about 100-150 people. It’s hard to pay attention. Add to that a bat or two hanging from the rafters trying to sleep, but stirring every so often, just enough to keep Jenny worrying that one might dive bomb her.

Another thing that makes it hard to keep up is that even though they say you can always find familiarity in catholic mass around the world because the same readings are used every where, I doesn’t seem like mass is the same each week here. There is always something a little different. For example, many times I definitely notice that they never consecrate the Eucharist and we sometimes skip the Our Father. Some weeks we say the Creed, others we don’t. A couple weeks ago mass went on for over 2 hours and we spent a chunk of 30 minutes straight kneeling on hard stone floor alternating between prayers and singing. We learned that its hard to tell when mass has officially ended because most people don’t get up and leave. They just chat amongst each other for a while, then sometimes start back up into singing and praying for another hour. Since the week of kneeling Jenny always tries to get us out before we get pulled into “extra innings”. I never know what to expect each week.

Aside from all the distractions the mass is beautiful. They don’t have a normal preist anymore because in our second week here he actually passed away from a heart attack at 4am on a Sunday morning. Mass was pretty sad that week, though I didn’t realize why until Alejandra explained it to me afterwards. Usually they have one of about 6 different guys take over as the “MC” who reads the gospel and gives the homily. It keeps it interesting with different styles each week and new faces. They also have a lively music group, which includes an electric guitar, and a couple acoustic guitars. The congregation is very active and there is even a Southern Baptist feel with Amens and responses during the homily. Most people sing too, though I haven’t figured out the words to their most common songs yet. I think I am slowly understanding more and more of it each week. I hope by the end of the year I’ll actually know a few of the songs.