Noche de las Velitas 2018

The Noche de las Velitas, or night of the little candles, is an annual celebration marking the start of the Christmas season. People light candles on sidewalks and windowsills. But it's also a time for families to sit in the street and talk with each other and neighbors.

The velitas tradition is particularly strong in La Candelaria, Bogotá's historical center. However, it seemed to me that this year I saw lots fewer candles lit than in previous years. Is the tradition waning?

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Fish Frenzy at Paloquemao

Hawking hanging fish in Paloquemao.

With Easter Week comes Lent, when millions of practicing Catholics give up meat for fish. That means packed fish markets, especially Paloquemao today which we visited during a bike tour.

Sliced bagre.

Dried, salted fish.

The demand was so great that they set up tents outside the market.

The fruit section was packed, too.

But the red meat section...abandoned.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

A Papal History of Bogotá

The ruins of the Archbishop's Palace in 1948, after the Bogotazo riots.

The Museo de Bogotá, located on Calle 10 between Carreras 3 and 4, has an exposition about the two previous papal visits: Pablo VI in 1968 and John Paul II in 1986. The city carried out some urban projects related to the visits, in particular a neighborhood built for Pablo near Simon Bolivar Park, which still carries his name. These are documented in the exhibit. But the real interest are the historic photos of central Bogotá sites.

Papal paraphenalia. Religious consumerism isn't new.

Plaza Bolivar in 1868.

Another view of Plaza Bolivar in 1868: A cattle pasture?

Plaza Bolivar around 1930.

Pope Pablo VI.

The interior of the Cabildo Eclesiastico.

And, to see Bogotanos' present-day Catholic fervor, take a look at the crowds still lining up in Plaza Bolivar today to see the image of the Virgen of Chiquinquira:

Waiting around. It's a long, long, line.

Pope Francis waves 'hi.'

Religious trinkets haven't gone out of style.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

A Lesson from Abortion Protesters

Abortion opponents have been holding this protest/vigil recently beside the Iglesia Santa Ana in Teusaquillo, which is surrounded by women's clinics with a reputation for providing mostly illicit abortions.

A women's clinic across
from the Santa Ana church.

In the past, I've seen anti-abortions protests outside the Palacio de Justicia and Congreso, when they have considered abortion law. Colombia's abortion law, while relatively liberal for the region, is still quite restrictive (abortion is permitted only in cases of rape, incest, when the woman's life is endangered and when the fetus is inviable, and often hard to obtain even in those cases). Abortion rights supporters say that, either despite or because of the law, nearly all of the procedures performed in Colombia are done illegally.

So, it always seemed a bit absurd to me to see the protesters at the centers of lawmaking, when the law was obviously so irrelevent to reality.

This is the first time I've seen protesters at the of abortions. Yet, by protesting here, they're also underlining the fact that abortion prohibitions feed an outlaw, and often dangerous, illicit abortion industry.

The campaign is named '40 Days for Life.'

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Semana Santa in Paloquemao

Dried, salted fish for sale in front of Paloquemao Market.

A few scenes of the shopping rush today in Paloquemao Market, particularly in the fish section.

No space for one more.

Check out this bagre.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Fired for Truth-Telling?

Yohir Akerman, ex-columnist. 

For years, Yohir Akerman wrote often polemical columns for Medellin's El Colombiano newspaper - columns often critical of religion and even of the newspaper's other columnists.

But when Akerman dared to suggest that the Good Lord could be - horrors of horrors - mistaken, he got ousted from the paper.

Akerman's latest and last column arose from the recent flap over the Universidad de la Sabana's opinion on the issue of adoption by same-sex couples. Sabana University, an elite private school located in north Bogotá, was founded by Opus Dei, the extremely conservative Catholic group. Predictably, the university's medical school recommended against permitting gay adoption. However, it went on to opine that homosexuals could be considered mentally ill, a position long since rejected by the medical establishment. The retrograde view on gay people brought the university so much criticism
that it issued a retraction.

In his newspaper columns, Akerman quoted Old Testament verses prescribing the

El Colombiano
newspaper.

death penalty - often by stoning - for adulterers, rebellious children, women who are not virgins at marriage and other 'wrongdoers.' He also also cited Bible verses endorsing slavery.

"All of these concepts are in the Bible," Akerman concluded, "and as history has demonstrated on these subjects, god was mistaken."

The newspaper appended this convoluted message to the column: 'Note from the directors: This newspaper promotes debate from respect and good arguments. We consider that this column strays from those principles. For the author, not publishing the column would mean his resignation. We publish it and accept his resignation.'

The directors did not explain why quoting the Bible constituted a lack or respect or good argument.

The Bible: Infallible?

Semana magazine quotes Akerman as saying that the paper's director criticized him particularly for not capitalizing the word 'god' and for asserting that God was mistaken.

In Sabana University's defense, it's not explicitly clear that its criticism of same-sex adoption was based on religious ideas. In fact, it doesn't seem unreasonable that growing up in a heterosexual family, which has been the norm for much of human and pre-human evolution, would be better for kids. But it also seems obvious that a loving, supportive family of any type is much better than an abusive one or being warehoused in an orphanage.

And the studies I've seen show that children of same-sex couples tend to out-perform those of heterosexual couples for a simple reason having little to do with the parents' gender or sexual orientation: they have highly-motivated parents who had to make lots of effort to have kids. In contrast, we all know that many heterosexual couples become parents by mistake.

For its part, Akerman's column seems to fall well within the spectrum of reasonable commentary. After all, he primarily quoted the Bible rather than attacking it.

Rather than summarily ousting Akerman, El Colombiano's editors might explain why the Bible is unerring, and therefore that death by stoning is a reasonable punishment for a range of moral 'lapses.'

But while they're at it, El Colombiano might also find itself endorsing a Christian version of the barbaric Islamic State.

As for the court, it ruled that, for now, same-sex couples could adopt only when the child was the biological offspring of one member of the couple, but that the legislature should regulate the issue.

Perhaps such an incremental decision is best in a highly-Catholic nation. In the U.S., when courts made rulings on controversial issues such as racial segregation and abortion it's led to years of conflict. Some things are best decided by the more democratic legislature.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

A Less and Less Catholic Colombia

Crowds of Bogotanos last night around the Christmas tree on Plaza Bolivar.

A Baptist Church in
central Bogotá.

Christmas is still a huge deal here in Colombia - but, according to a recent survey, it's no longer such a Catholic one.

According to the survey, by the Washington D.C.-based Pew Research Center, Colombia is still one of the region's most Catholic countries, with 79% of the population identifying themselves as Catholic. Paraguay, at 89%, was the most Catholic, and Uruguay, at 42%, the least.

But Colombian Catholics appear to be leaving the religion at the fastest rate. It is the nation with the largest proportion of non-Catholics who were raised as Catholics.

The fastest-growing evangelical churches are Pentecostals, who tend to be fundamentalists who believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible. As a result, the retreat of the generally conservative Catholic Church could mean that many people are becoming even more conservative in their values.

'As Catholics become more liberal on such questions (as gay rights and abortion), that points to looming American-style “culture wars”,' predicts an article in The Economist.

'Jesus Loves You,' say religious activists on Ave. Septima.

The Catholic Church could be losing adherents for various reasons, including scandals and a decreasing number of priests. (But while the Catholic Church has had headline-making scandals, Colombian evangelicals have as well.) In contrast to Catholicism, in many evangelical churches, almost anybody can become a minister, and celibacy is not required. As a result, Protestant churches can evangelize more actively and create a more personal relationship with members.

Protestant churches can be “family-like,” David Stoll, an anthropology professor at Middlebury College in Vermont, told The Economist.

Faith or materialism?
Christmas vendors
crowd Plaza San Victorino. 

The Pew study found a strong correlation between migration and conversion to Protestantism, probably because of the availability of Protestant ministers available to evangelize them. The evangelical churches are also growing most strongly amongst the poor.

The Catholic Church's slide in the region comes despite the popularity of Pope Francis, the church's first pope from Latin America.

Colombia has been officially secular since it created a new Constitution in 1991. However, its precise relationship to Catholicism is still being defined. Secular organizations recently protested the creation of a commemoration day for Madre Laura, a Catholic nun who evangelized indigenous people and in May of this year became Colombia's first Catholic saint. While a high court ruled in favor of creating a holiday honoring the Madre Laura, it stopped short of making her the patron saint of Colombia's teachers.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Hidden Women Revealed!

The controversial 'Mujeres Ocultas' (Hidden Women) exhibition which was opposed by conservative Catholic organizations is on display now in the Museo Santa Clara a block south of Plaza Bolivar. The conservative organizations filed 86 tutelas, or lawsuits, against the exhibition's opening in the museum - which was a church attached to a convent - because of the works' erotic content. The artist, Maria Eugenia Trujillo, mixes and erotic and sacred to represent how women have been 'held in custody, cloistered, forced to submit,' according to the museum.

A museum guide said that each year the Santa Clara selects three outside exhibitions related to the museum's content and history. And Trujillo's work is certainly related. After all, the nuns of this convent were permanently cloistered: once they entered, they never saw the outside world again. Above and at one end of the museum's exhibition hall - once the convent's church - is a dark wooden wall with holes in it. Behind this wall sat the nuns so that they could watch the service while remaining unseen. In 1983, the building became a museum and the Catholic Church officially deconcecrated it, making it a secular place. Altho the artworks on display are all religious, the pieces are considered secular cultural artifacts, a museum guide said.

However, the conservative protesters argued that displaying the erotic material in the one-time Catholic church amounted to a desecration and an attack on their faith. A judge ordered the exhibition temporarily closed, but a Cundinamarca court later ruled that it could go ahead.

Like the subjects of most such controversies, the artworks here are quite tame, tamer than what you see most nights on prime-time television.

A display criticizes the Catholic church as repressing women and reducing them to 'a single function: procreation.' 

The Santa Clara Museum also contains a permanent display of death portraits of the convent's nuns.

Under the church's alter is a crypt, where prominent people were once buried. Other graves were found under the church's floor. All of these remains were moved to the crypt. Recently, the bones were lent to Universidad de los Andes students, who hope to learn from them about common causes of death hundreds of years ago.




By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours