CRUZ DAS almas: a BRAZILIAN VILLAGE' — ^PIERSON 



175 



A young mother : 



Jly little girl once was very sick. She was so sick that 

 ler legs from the knees down were cold and so swollen 

 hat they looked like they would burst. She could keep 

 lothing on her stomach. Then I made a vow to Sao Bene- 

 lito that if he would make it worth while to give her 

 medicine, I'd have her be a festeira at the fesia for him 

 ind she would walk in the procession, wearing wings like 

 in angel. Soon after we gave her the medicine, she turned 

 to me and said she was hungry, and in two days she was 

 sating like she alwa.vs did. 



A villager, aged 62 : 



Not long ago, I had a bad pain in my stomach. It got 

 30 bad I couldn't eat. Easter Sunday I made a vow not 

 to eat meat on Friday ''' for a whole year if I could get 

 better. Now I'm much improved. 



A farm woman, 43 years old : 



When I lose something, I make a promessa to Santo 

 Antonio and in a little while it appears. I make a vow 

 to pray the Respons6rio and then I tell my husband about 

 it, because it would be awful if I was to die without ful- 

 filling the promessa and he did not know about it. Be- 

 sides, he has to help me pray the Rcsponsdrio because I 

 don't know how to read. 



A farm woman, 52 years old : 



I have a vow to fulfill, but it is very difficult to do. Two 

 of my children, a son and a daughter, were both sick at the 

 same time. They had the grippe. I worked so hard to 

 take care of them that I too became sick and then there 

 were three of us in bed at the same time. My sister came 

 over to help us. She made a vow that if we all got well, 

 we would have a photograph made and I would take it to 

 Pirapora. We all got well. But before we could get the 

 photograph taken my daughter got sick again and died. 

 Now I suppose the only way to fulfill the vow is to take 

 a picture of myself and my son with another daughter. 



A farmer, aged 48 : 



My mother made a promessa for me when I was about 

 13 or 14 years old. I didn't know anything about it. I 

 was very sick at the time. She promised that I would 

 go to Pirapora and 'exchange" (buy) a sanio, a Sao Bom 

 Jesus de Pirapora— it need not be a very big santo — and 

 then go from farm to farm here, asking for alms, and take 

 the money and the santo and leave them in Pirapora. Al- 

 though she made the promessa for me, I am the one who 

 has to fulfill it. If I don't, she is not to blame. Nothing 

 will happen to her. But I will be punished. If I don't 

 fulfill it before I die, my arma will come back to trouble 

 my relatives until the promessa is fulfilled. Just the other 

 day my mother was saying to me, "You must fulfill that 

 promessa." But for me, that's very difficult. 



A few individuals never make promessas be- 

 cause they consider them too difficult to fulfill 

 and the risk of not fulfilling them too great. They 

 believe that faith, if sufficient, is an adequate sub- 

 stitute. "Wlien I need something very much," 

 said a mother of four children, "I just ask God 

 with faith. I am not in the habit of making 

 promessas. They are so difficult to 'pay.' And 

 you must 'psiy'; for if you don't the santo will 

 chastise you. Ever afterward, if anything hap- 

 pens, you can't help thinking it's the santo punish- 

 ing you." "I never make a promessa for any of 

 my children," remarked another mother. "I ask 

 God with faith and God helps. That which is 

 most valuable is faith." 



Vows occasionally are made for animals, as well 

 as human beings. "Will you take a photograph of 

 my dog?" asked a villager. "When he was sick, 

 I made a promessa to Sao Bom Jesus de Pirapora 

 that if he got well, I'd take a photograph of him 

 to the santo. He's well and I must fulfill that 



promise. 



ROMARIAS 



^' A special ciispensation some years aso lifted the obligation 

 of meatless Fridays in Catholic homes in Brazil, and in certain 

 other countries, with the exception of the final Friday of Lent. 



Each year, a romaria, or group pilgrimage, is 

 made by a number of local inhabitants to the 

 famous shrine of Sao Bom Jesus de Pirapora 

 (Vieira da Cunha, 1937), in a town some distance 

 away. This pilgrimage appears to be a compara- 

 tively recent revival of an old custom which for 

 some years had been abandoned. A villager re- 

 calls that "people here used to make this pilgrim- 

 age every year but, about 30 years ago, it got so 

 that fewer and fewer people went and finally they 

 stopped going altogether and there was no x^il- 

 grimage for a number of years." 



For several months in 1939, however, the region 

 in which the village is located was scourged by a 

 severe drought. Several of the more devout in- 

 habitants thought this might be due to the discon- 

 tinuance of the yearly pilgrimage and a niunber 

 of persons consequently made a promessa that if 

 the much-needed rain fell, the pilgrimage would 

 be resumed and made regularly every year there- 

 after. "It was a real miracle," recalls a local 

 farmer. "Two days later, we got a good rain. 

 And from that time to this, we have never failed 

 to make the pilgrimage." 



The romaria ordinarily is made in September. 

 It is customarily made just previous to the festa 

 of Nossa Senhora da Piedade, the patron santa 



