First Religious Experiences
In which Teófilo talks about his first religious experiences which were quite ordinary and run-of-the-mill except for one moment of realismo mágico. Also, a memory of a pot-boiling octopus.
A Catholic Home
The Catholic Church and the culture it’d formed in Puerto Rico were cotidinious facts in my early life. Religious pluralism had arrived to the Island with the American flag. The Church’s cultural hegemony was ending. Even so the Church was still influential among the families that took their cues from the Church of Rome. My family was one of them.
A saint visits me
The religious experiences of my early childhood were boring and ordinary. There were no bells or whistles, nothing extraordinary except for one that stands out. It didn’t happen to me, but I was its object.
Mom once told me about her vision of St. Martín de Porres (+1639) standing by my crib, blessing me. St. Martín was a Peruvian lay Dominican brother canonized by Pope St. John XXIII in 1962. St. Martín is the patron saint of mixed-race people and all seekers of racial harmony among others.
There might be more rational explanations for Mom's vision. One of those explanations might even be right. Also, there would come a time in which I stopped taking Mom’s claims about anything at face value. This one I like because it was a moment of magical realism, a blurred moment of fantasy and reality. I hold everyone deserves at least one such moment in their lives.
Sacramental Initiations
All my other earlier religious experiences were ordinary. I was baptized 40 days after my birth - "40" being a biblical number hit by chance. My godparents, Eliseo Borrero and María Victoria Martínez, were and remain an exceptional couple.
Padrino Eliseo is a pillar of our community. He's a retired administrator of Immaculate Conception Hospital in San Germán. He's also a US Army veteran, and thanks to his clear, gentle baritone, a one-time radio host. María Victoria, known as a “Tollín” (“toh-JEEHN”) to her family, worked for CORCO. She was an Executive Secretary. Later in life she would earn a doctorate in education. “Madrina Tollín” as I would call her. was a first cousin to Mom, daughter of a sister of my grandfather Don Pedro. My godparents' youngest son, Daniel, would become one of my closest friends and sort of an older brother to me.
My confirmation followed a year-and-a-half after my birth. It took place at Our Lady of Mercy church in Ponce. My confirmation godfather was Ramón Ramos Rodríguez. He was a local jurist known to Papi. Long after Ramón and Papi passed away I found out Papi had consulted Ramón on legal matters related to my parentage. I never found out what they discussed.
Padrino Ramón owned a magnificent light blue and white parrot as a pet. It knew several words I can’t recall now, but it fascinated me. An animal that could talk! It’s a tragedy I only spoke with Padrino Ramón a couple of times of inconsequential youthful matters. I did attend his wake when I was an adolescent. I did say good-bye. I'm sad I hardly knew him.
First Proper Memories
My first religious memories consist of a faded picture of The Sacred Heart. It was yellowish-green and had seen better days. My grandparents kept itover a small table in their bedroom alongside awooden cross. The cross was about 12 inches tall and had no corpus. In time Papi would add one. They also had a statue of the Immaculate Conception, its blue and white paint flaking in many places.
The Sacred Heart picture terrified me. The eyes of the Jesus figure seem to follow me around the room. Complicating matters I never knew if he was either happy or angry to see me. When my grandparents sent me to fetch for them anything from their room, I would run in and out of the bedroom fast. I tried never to look at the Lord’s picture while in the bedroom, much less at his eyes.
I remember my first visit to Ponce’s cathedral church. Titi Gloria was the one who took me there, and she was carrying me aloft. I became enamored of the sound of my own echo as I experimented with different cries and tones. A clergyman in a black cassock, came to tell Titi Gloria she had to take the noisy child outside. She did walk out.
There you have it. My first conscious experience in the Lord’s House was of my expulsion from it by an annoyed clergyman. I took no offense. I returned to that church later in life, many times, always watching over my shoulder for an angry priest.
Observing the Major Feast Days
Holy Week was a week of very special observance during my early childhood. We observed increasing silence during the week starting on Palm Sunday. Religious programming increased in television every passing day of the week. On Good Friday every commercial television station broadcasted all-religious programs and movies. Our house went meatless. The smells of fish and vegetables filled the house. Once, Mamá - or was it both Titi Gloria and Mom? - cooked an octopus for a salad. I remember to this day its smell and the sight of its tentacles and suction cups, floating in its bubbling soup.
I didn’t taste it then, and refuse to taste octopus of any kind to this day. The memory of the smelly octopus is a core, long-lasting memory.
Easter Sunday came and it was the day to break the meat fast. Papi brought freshly-baked bread from his favorite panadería. The day took a festive but restful mood.
Christmas was the other season we observed as a family. I looked forward to toys both on Christmas Day and Epiphany. Epiphany was the original religious observance in Puerto Rico. It was the day in which the Three Wise Men brought toys to children. In return, children had to prepare a box with hay for the camels eat. don’t think I ever did it myself, though. No problem, I still got my presents.
Everyone would decorate the house with lights well before Christmas. The lights came down after the Epiphany octave in mid-January. The pine trees planted in our front yard got a full treatment. Yellow, red, orange, blue, green lights transformed the trees. The entire neighborhood joined in with their own decorations. There was music and laughter and I was happy.
With Mamá Ana’s cancer, things would change in the years to come. The lights would go dark, the joy would depart, and religious practice would become perfunctory.