Holy Week (Semana Santa) is the Christian spring festival celebrated in the week leading up to Easter Sunday.
We don’t make much of it in New York, but Holy Week is the most important holiday in the Latin world, when people take time off to visit their families, like Americans do at Thanksgiving.
In pre-literate times, religious theater was used to teach the faith. Many churches still hold solemn, theatrical processions of the passion of Christ. Preparations are as important as the event itself, because they bring communities together.
The Days of Holy Week
The date varies every year because it is based on the northern spring equinox and the phases of the moon.
The days of the week are:
- Palm Sunday
- Holy Monday
- Holy Tuesday
- Holy Wednesday
- Maundy Thursday
- Good Friday is a national holiday in many Latin countries.
- Holy Saturday and the Easter Vigil
It all leads to Easter, which isn’t technically part of Holy Week, but it is all one celebration. Old Catholic tradition celebrated important events in octaves of eight days.
In some countries, Easter Monday is a national holiday.
Around the World
This week is very important around the Latin world. There are famous reenactments of the passion of Christ in Mexico, Guatemala, the Philippines, and Spain.
In Spain, some groups walk in Holy Week processions with robes and pointed hoods. As an American, the sight of hooded figures makes me uncomfortable, but they do not represent the discredited American white supremacist group.
Faces are covered to represent regret for sins committed during the past year. The robes represent the traditional attire of the people of Nazareth. The hoods come from the Spanish Inquisition of the 1400s, when those convicted of religious crimes were forced to wear conical hoods. Different colored robes represent different religious groups. We all see the world through our particular cultural lens, and this is a good example. Things can have one meaning in one culture, and an entirely different meaning in another.
The tradition may have started in Seville, Spain. Arturo Schomburg, founder of New York’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, said the tradition may actually have originated in the first Black brotherhood in Seville, Spain when the city had a large African Diaspora population. Affectionately called “Los Negritos,” the brotherhood is one of the oldest in Europe (1393) and the oldest surviving brotherhood in Spain. It was founded as a community support group for members of the African Diaspora who found themselves on the streets.
Christian Easter traditions derive from Jewish Passover traditions. Many northern cultures celebrate spring in their own way at this time. In whatever way makes sense to you, may you and your family have a blessed Holy Week.