These spiritual services, however, are peripheral to 

 the principal religious activity of pcnitentes — the 

 Lenten obsei-vance of the Passion and death of Jesus. 

 During Holy Week, prayer meetings, rosaries, and via 

 crucis processions with religious images are held at the 

 morada and at a site representing Calvary [calvario) , 

 usually the local cemetery. On Good Friday, vigils are 

 kept and the morada is darkened for a service known 

 as las tiniehlas. The ceremony of "the darkenings" 

 consists of silent prayer broken by violent noise making. 

 Metal sheets and chains, wooden blocks and rattles are 

 manipulated to suggest natural disturbances at the 

 moment of Jesus' death on the cross. This emphatic 

 portrayal of His last houi-s is recalled also by acts of 

 contrition and flagellation in penitcnte initiation rites, 

 punishments, and Holy Week processions. 



Penitentes use physical discipline and mortification 

 as a dramatic means to intensify their imitation of Jesus' 

 sufTering.* Heavy timber crosses [madcros) and cactus 

 whips {disciplinas) are used in processions that often 

 include a figure of death in a cart [la carreta de la 

 muerte) . Disciplinaiy and initiatory mortification in 

 the morada makes use of flint or glass blood-letting 

 devices [padcrnales] .' 



Origins of the Penitente Movement 



By 1833, bodily penance practiced in lay brotherhoods 

 of Hispano Catholics attracted criticism from the 

 Church in New Mexico and resulted in the pejorative 

 name penitentes." Historically, however, within the 

 traditional framework of Hispanic Catholicism, the 

 penitentes had precedents for their religious practices, 

 including flagellation. 



Penitente rites were derived from Catholic services 

 already common in colonial New Mexico. Prayers and 

 rosaries said before altars comprised an important part 

 of Hispano religious observances, and processions of 

 Catholics and penitentes alike were announced by bell, 

 drum, and rifle in Hispano villages. In particular. 



penitentes used via crucis processions to dramatize the 

 Passion, portrayed in every Catholic church by the 

 fourteen Stations of the Cross. Penitentes also main- 

 tained Catholic Lenten practices by holding tenebrae 

 services, the tinieblas rites mentioned above, and by 

 flagellation. 



These parallels between Catholic and penitente 

 religious observances caused Edmonson to theorize that 

 "the autonomous movement originated within the 

 Church." " Variations, however, between the two 

 religious traditions led Edmonson to discover "an im- 

 portant thread of religious independence and even 

 apostasy in New Mexican history." ^'' Edmonson's 

 study of 1950 has established the persistence of peni- 

 tente activity in Hispano culture. 



Three and a half centuries earlier, in 1598, Spanish 

 settlers made a courageous thrust into the inhospitable 

 environment of New Mexico. Through the 17th and 

 18th centuries, Spanish setdement along the upper 

 Rio Grande was a tenuous thread unraveled from a 

 stronger fabric in Mexico. .Aridity and extremes in 

 temperatures marked New Mexico's climate. Arable 

 land was scarce and could be extended back from 

 streams only by careful upkeep of the irrigation ditches. 

 Plateaus rose from 1500 to more than 2500 meters in 

 altitude. Building timbers were hard to obtain without 

 roads or navigable rivers. 



Finally, distance itself was a challenge, sometimes 

 insurmountable for the supply caravans from Mexico. 

 Outfitted over a thousand miles to the south of Santa 

 Fe, the Mexican caravans brought presidio and mission 

 supplies, but few goods for the common settler. By the 

 end of the i8th century, Spanish authorities thought 

 of the northern colonies [provincias internas) pri- 

 marily as missionary fields and military buffer zones." 



Cultural traditions and an insecure environment 

 caused Spanish colonists to turn to religion for com- 

 fort. Again, however, a supply problem arose. In- 

 dividual ranches were too scattered for clerical visits, 

 and even settlements that were grouped for greater 

 security, pohlacioncs or plazas, became visitas on little 



6. George Wharton James, New Mexico: Land of the 

 Delight Makers (Boston, 1920), lists concisely the Biblical 

 and historical references to religious mortification practiced by 

 New Mexican penitentes. 



7. Darley (op. cit., pp. 8 ff.) gives an exhaustive list of 

 methods of mortification said to be used by penitentes. 



8. Angelico Chavez, Archives of the Archdiocese of Santa 

 Fe, 1678-igoo (Washington, 1957): "Books of Patentes," 

 1833: books xi, xii, xix, Ixxiii, and Ixxxii. (Original documents 

 from archives noted hereinafter as .^ASF. ) 



9. Edmonson, p. 33. 



10. Ibid., p. 18. 



I!. H. E. Bolton, "The Spanish Borderlands and the 

 Mission as a Frontier Institution," American Historical Re- 

 view (Santa Fe. 1917). vol. 23, pp. 42-61. indicates that this 

 policy was developed after 1765 by Charles III of Spam in 

 an attempt to reorganize the administration of his vast colonial 

 empire. 



PAPER 63: THE PENITENTE MORADAS OF ABIQUIU 



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