Each Holy Week in Spain, thousands of people stand along city streets around the country waiting for Renaissance images of Christ crucified and Our Lady of Sorrows to pass by. A marching band playing somber but dramatic music accompanies parades of often black or white clothed figures known as nazarenos, or penitents, wearing hooded robes called capirotes and carrying statues on their shoulders. Every few feet the entourage halts and the handlers sway in place, “dancing” the statue before the public. In southern Spain, onlookers shout “Viva, Guapa!” to images of Our Lady.
The Spanish actor Antonio Banderas is famous for never missing Holy Week in his hometown of Málaga. He has often served as mayordomo—the leader of the procession—in the Cofradía de la Virgen de Lágrimas y Favores (the Confraternity of Our Lady of Tears and Favors).
In May, three of these confraternities will travel to Rome for the Jubilee of Confraternities on May 17 and May 18, when they will celebrate a grand procession through the streets of the Eternal City along with confraternities from France and Italy. Members of these centuries-old Catholic lay organizations hope the pilgrimage proves a moment of renewal for an important part of lay life that in Spain finds itself in the crosshairs of secularization.
The Rev. José Manuel del Rio Carrasco, a Spanish priest who works in the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments in Rome, explained to America that a confraternity is a specific type of lay organization, a group founded and led by laity who come together voluntarily to practice a particular devotion. The confraternities operate under the authority of the local bishop, and historically they have undertaken works of charity. In the United States, perhaps the best-known example is the Confraternity of Christian Mothers, which originated in France.
Spain’s confraternities often make headlines in the foreign press as their Holy Week processions have become a tourist attraction, demonstrating the complex reality of their fame.
Medieval origins
Alejandro Garcia Montero, a member of the Confraternity of the Sweet Name of Jesus of Nazareth in León, Spain, which will participate in the procession in Rome, told America that the confraternities have their origins in medieval guilds—collectives of local artisans such as bakers and blacksmiths. Besides its professional function, every guild had a patron saint and provided a Christian burial for each member. Celebrating the feast day of their intercessors and praying for deceased members were integral to life of the guild.
But the guilds began to lose their social and economic relevance during the 15th century. As they faded away, penitential confraternities sprang up in their place. Instead of prayers to a saint, their piety centered on Christ with a focus on his Passion. Each confraternity commissioned a statue, either of Christ or Mary, representing some moment of the Passion.
During Holy Week, the cofrades, or members, cover their faces in humility and bear the devotional image of our savior on their own shoulders to share a bit in Jesus’ suffering. “It’s a theatrical presentation of the Passion,” Mr. Montero explained, in which the whole city can participate, some as actors, some as spectators.
Mr. Montero’s confraternity was founded in 1611. It created a procession that passed by León’s convents so that even cloistered nuns could enjoy the processional spectacle. The confraternity still follows that ancient route today.
Though founded by laity, Mr. Montero said that the confraternities once had close associations with religious orders, particularly mendicant orders such as the Franciscans and Dominicans. At that time, the convent churches served as spiritual headquarters for the confraternities, providing a place to house their statues and to hold devotions and liturgies throughout the year.
Charity work has been essential to the role of confraternities from their earliest incarnations. “Spain and part of Europe, at the end of the Middle Ages, suffered a great economic crisis,” comparable to economic crises of modern times, Mr. Montero said.
The confraternities once supported their extensive works of mercy with self-sustaining business operations. They also helped support the religious communities in whose churches they prayed. For several centuries they formed an important part of the fabric of European society.
That started to change at the end of the 17th century, during the Enlightenment Era. In Spain, King Carlos III forced a consolidation of the confraternities and limited their processions to Good Friday. As the Industrial Revolution got underway in the middle of the 19th century, the monarchy confiscated large swaths of church and communal peasant property to place it in private hands.
This seizure included the businesses maintained by the confraternities—typically mills, iron forges and farms. Additionally, many of the religious houses and communities that confraternities worked with closed, unable to support themselves.
A revival under Franco
The confraternities limped through the next century, sometimes targeted by anti-clerical movements of the times. But under Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, who ruled Spain from the end of that country’s civil war in 1939 until his death in 1975, confraternities experienced a revival.
According to Mr. Montero, Franco promoted the confraternities and particularly their processions to rally support for his regime, which he characterized as a protector of Spain’s Catholic heritage. Mr. Montero said that the revival of the confraternities under Franco formed part of a National Catholicism—part of a religious movement that began in 19th century Europe. In Spain it was at least partly deployed to shore up the Franco regime’s authoritarian rule.
New confraternities were founded and Holy Week processions began across Spain, and the confraternities were allowed to expand their celebrations beyond Good Friday. But according to Mr. Montero, this political and social renaissance lacked spiritual depth, and the activity of the confraternities was limited to once-a-year Holy Week processions.
“It’s true that [Franco] revitalizes the confraternities, but there is another part, and I know that this generates a lot of controversy,” Mr. Montero said. “They are brotherhoods with a lot of appearance, but behind the facade there is no religious foundation.”
Though the fervor of Spain’s National Catholicism faded during the 1950s, when Spanish society began to secularize, the popularity of the Holy Week processions remained strong. Then in the 1960s, Franco’s government saw in the processions a powerful opportunity to promote tourism, an effort continued by subsequent democratic governments.
Spanish cities now strive to have their Holy Week celebrations endorsed and promoted by the government. During the 1990s a new wave of interest in confraternities was inspired by their historical and anthropological value.
Spain’s confraternities have adapted in other ways to changing times. Once open only to men, confraternities of women were founded in the 20th century, and many “brotherhoods” are now co-ed. Participation in the processions has become a family affair, with even children donning the characteristic robes and walking in penitence.
Involving the younger generation is essential, Mr. Montero said, if the tradition is going to survive.
Secular or spiritual?
According to Mr. Montero, the conversion of Holy Week into a national spring break focused on tourism has contributed to Spain’s secularization. The processions of the confraternities have not been immune to that influence. They can sometimes seem more like social clubs than vehicles for deepening Christian faith. For some members the annual Holy Week procession is the only formal religious practice or contact with the church.
Even the processions themselves can be at cross purposes with the liturgical celebration of the Triduum, he said. Some overlap with the timing of the Mass of the Last Supper on Holy Thursday or the Passion of the Lord on Good Friday, and local priests can be annoyed that members of the confraternities do not attend these liturgies.
But, he argued, the public representation of the Passion remains an important and powerful communal moment for telling the story of Christ in a secular society.
He sees the processions as “the liturgy in the streets.” And many confraternities have revived traditional practices, finding new ways of engaging in local charity efforts and coming together to celebrate Mass and other devotional practices throughout the year.
With all these challenges in mind, deepening the spirituality of the confraternities is an ongoing concern of church leaders, according to Father del Rio Carrasco.
“We don’t want [confraternity members] to feel that they are just carrying art from here to there or participating in a folkloric cultural activity,” Father del Rio Carrasco said. “We want them to feel that they are active members of the church.”
The opportunity for connection and contact with the church that the confraternities and the processions provide remains an opportunity for evangelization, catechesis and a deepening of faith. “We have to take advantage of this contact,” Mr. Montero said.
He hopes the Holy Year pilgrimage may be one more such moment for the Holy Spirit to awaken his faith and that of all confraternity members.
