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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY— PUBLICATION NO. 3 



the fiestas). Most men of adult age take the posi- 

 tion that they, of course, are members of the church, 

 but that the devotions are mainly an affair of women. 

 Most men questioned could not remember when they 

 had confessed last or had taken communion. Many 

 men over 35 years of age had confessed only once or 

 twice in their lives. All of them know the Pater 

 Noster (Lord's Prayer), but that is all that many of 

 them know. Strings of rosary beads are possessed 

 by some women and old men, but the average man 

 never uses them. Several men did not know what 

 they were. Apparently, confirmation does not as a 

 rule involve the organized study and memorization of 

 the catechism, and most of my informants report that 

 they have been confirmed without effective examina- 

 tion at about the age of 12 in a body of boys, when 

 the bishop of a "mission" of friars had come to the 

 town for that purpose. Parents are, of course, en- 

 joined to provide religious instruction in the home, 

 but perhaps the majority fail to provide anything ef- 

 fective. I found it quite impossible to obtain a 

 coherent explanation of church doctrine or "what 

 the church stands for" from any Mochero, or, in fact, 

 from the forastcros. One concludes that the church 

 to the typical individual represents not a body of 

 verbal teachings and precepts, but a body of personal 

 and group experiences. The most devout Catholics 

 among men whom I could contact were a few older 

 men, retired from active life, who spent a good deal 

 of their time reciting prayers, taking communion, and 

 confessing. It seemed to me for a time that I must 

 have involuntarily associated with only the very 

 secular-minded or indifferently minded section of the 

 male population, but attendance at services in the 

 church tended to confirm the picture. On ordinary 

 Sundays, it is common to see only a handful of adult 

 Mochero men in the church, amounting to about one- 

 tenth the number of the women present, and very few 

 taking communion. The men are usually at the back 

 of the ciuirch, sitting on stone benches along the sides, 

 or standing. They go in and out during the service, 

 indulge in a certain amount of conversation among 

 themselves, and. although respectful in attitude, do 

 not give evidence of strong attention or emotional in- 

 volvement. 



Apparently the true definition of "devotion" in 

 Moche consists in participation in the mayordomlas 

 which operate the various fiestas. A man who gives 

 contributions to these organizations is a devoted and 

 respected man, and one who participates is even 

 more so. Many men seem to have an attachment to 



one of the saints whose days they celebrate. They 

 pray to the saint and believe that he takes a personal 

 interest in their worldly welfare. Many, if not the 

 majority, of persons thus devoted to saints know 

 nothing of the saint as an historical personage, but 

 are devoted to the image itself. In conversation they 

 admit that the image is representative of a saint, not 

 the saint itself, but the ideas of who or what is repre- 

 sented by the image, are vague. On the other hand, 

 an individual takes an active interest in the physical 

 welfare of the image to which he is devoted, helps in 

 keeping it clean, dressing it, refurbishing its paint, 

 and so on. One of the best ways of showing one's 

 devotion to a saint is to provide at one's own expense 

 a siidario or some other ceremonial garment or 

 ornament for the image. There is a qualified em- 

 broiderer in the town who makes most of his living 

 from preparing these gifts, usually made of velvet, 

 richly embroidered with gold and silver thread and 

 ornamented with glass brilliants, sequins, and other 

 bright decorations. 



Women seem to participate more often and more 

 earnestly in the rituals of the church than do men. 

 They attend confession and take communion, on the 

 average, much more frequently than men. Also, 

 they are organized into groups which meet occasion- 

 ally in the church in the afternoon or at night to sing 

 novcnas for a departed relative and in adoration of 

 various saints. The average woman is better 

 acquainted with the prayers and rituals. For this 

 reason, the priest apparently has more contact with 

 the women than with the men of the community. 

 Women are also devoted to saints, but they do not 

 participate formally in the mayordomias. One of the 

 richer women, as a sign of her devotion, presented 

 one of the images of the Christ with a siidario in 

 October of 1944 which cost 700 soles. 



In Moche there is no organization of laymen 

 similar to the Knights of Columbus or the Catholic 

 Action groups which endeavor elsewhere to some 

 extent to interpret and to apply the precepts of the 

 church for the benefit of laymen to the affairs of the 

 world and of the community. 



SOME PSYCHOLOGICAL ASPECTS IN MOCHE 



From the psychological point of view an im- 

 portant aspect of the church's function in Moche is 

 that it does not create a load of anxieties for the 

 individual. The Mocheros do not have "consciences" 

 of a type with which so many North Americans and 

 North Europeans are equipped and from which they 



t 



