Ofrendas y recuerdos–offerings and memories

In my archival work, visits to Juquila, and interviews with devotees, the dynamic of taking offerings to the shrine, and bringing home devotional items purchased there has remained a constant. Groups and individuals fill the trees and open spaces around the pedimento with banners and tokens of their gratitude. Many individuals leave chunky votive candles in one of several chapels expressly designed for this purpose. Supporting these endeavors, a warren of stalls outside the shrine make use of every possible inch of space to display the rich array of devotional merchandise.

It is important not to just think of the offerings and items purchased as mere souvenirs. In this I concur with the perceptive analysis offered in Frank Graziano’s recent book, “Miraculous Images and Votive Offerings in Mexico.” Although I can’t do justice to Graziano here, his emphasis on devotions as a complex realm of narration is very helpful. In simplest terms, devotees essentially tell the story of their lives, trips to the shrine, personal hardships, and prayers granted through their saga of belief and commitment to the Virgin of Juquila. In other words, personal histories, testimony of Juquilita’s miraculous intercession, and the powerful role of the items offered and items carried home are interwoven into a single personal narrative: each devotee continually writes and rewrites their own life story as they chart their life of devotion over time. In a sense, life is infused with transcendent significance in the process.

Last week I interviewed Doña Mila, and witnessed this dynamic in action. She describes growing up in the countryside working alongside her parents and 10 siblings, and a childhood where relatives made the trip to Juquila when time and meager finances allowed. Economic necessity forced her to leave her pueblo 40 years ago, and make her living cooking and cleaning in other people’s homes. Nonetheless, she sustained an abiding devotion to the Virgin of Juquila, and has visited the shrine seven or eight times. She attests to several miracles granted by the Virgin. First, as a young woman she received her help in calming a difficult romantic attachment and painful heartache. Years later, an uncle took a special candle from her pueblo to Juquila to help her with a painful, disfiguring skin condition. Doña Mila asserts that at the precise time it was lit at the shrine the problem began to disappear. And, she notes, the image from Juquila brought back by this uncle remains prominently on the family home altar. The Virgin also, she claims, helped her find a way to build her own room connected to her parents’ home. More recently, she has sought and received Juquilita’s help in curing a dear friend of cancer. In addition to these stories, Doña Mila’s retelling of visits to Juquila in buses full of likeminded women, or in friend’s cars, is both her chronicle of devotion and a chronicle of her most important relationships. As Graziano points out, histories of devotion tend to turn back to the emotion-laden, lived experiences of devotees. Ostensibly the protagonist is the miraculous image, but what emerges is also a kind of devout autobiography.

Perhaps my favorite part of Doña Mila’s testimony was her description of a recent trip to Juquila. Like so many others, she took a candle and offered it to Juquilita. However, she noticed that workers at the shrine periodically collected pilgrim offerings and threw them away. They really do pile up after a while, she admits. Doña Mila prayed by her burning candle for a time, and then told Juquilita that instead of having her candle tossed out she would take it home and finish burning it by the image on her altar.

Juquila en cifras–By the numbers

Here you have a map of the “classic” pilgrimage route. Painted directly on a wall, it graces the waiting area where passenger vans depart for Juquila. Oaxaca perches top right, landmarks dot the route, and la Virgencita hovers in the southeast corner. Aside from charting the pilgrimage, how might we measure shrine visitation in Juquila? There are some numbers out there, but it is clear to me that the “facts” will remain impressionistic.

In 2014, with the Vatican-approved coronation of the Virgin of Juquila in the offing, a national newspaper claimed that 700,000 people visited the shrine annually. In 2015 Oaxacan state officials announced funding allotted for improvements along the pilgrimage route claiming 2.5 million visitors. Where did these numbers come from and why is the latter 3 times larger than the former?

The earliest detailed account of the pilgrimage estimated 23,000 devotees attended the Virgin’s festival in the mid-eighteenth century. A late-nineteenth-century journalist once surmised that 30,000 people took part. Priests managing the shrine didn’t estimate total attendance, although they occasionally noted if it was particularly well-attended, or less so. One of these managers, however, wrote financial reports that offer some hints. Father Cornelio Bourguet typically offered two numbers: the amount amassed through donations and the sale of wax and souvenirs; and the fees he collected for mass intentions. In 1941 the sum of these two figures was 12098.00 pesos. During the years spanning 1953 and 1959, pilgrimage earnings rose from $47,015 to $109,252, although 1961 and 1962 they dropped off somewhat to a still respectable $78,586 and $83,952 respectively. Bourguet also recorded costs at times, and these rise from $1,755 in 1953 to $4,764 in 1961, which perhaps tells us something about inflation, although greater attendance would have increased costs too. The problem is that Bourguet’s reputation, by the early 1960s, was under attack. For the next 2 decades, he was dogged by accusations of political manipulation and corruption until he was ousted by protests. His reports, then, may underreport the pilgrimage’s earnings, but growth, in any case, seem certain.

For the 1970s through the 1990s, there appear to be no records that shed light on attendance. However, some of the communities sustaining long-distance pilgrimages date their traditions from this era. What emerges from interviews is that as roads improved, and commercial networks within southern Mexico expanded, individuals involved in trade began to organize pilgrimages to Juquila. Commerce and devotion, I am continually reminded, ride the same rails. In addition, it became increasingly common for Oaxacans to visit Juquilita whenever opportunity, or perceived need, allowed/dictated. Sometimes they just stopped at the shrine on their way to the beach.

It is this growing DIY realm of religious tourism and shrine visitation that it gained the attention of government and church officials. I have wondered if this is a kind of neoliberal phenomenon. No longer does the state or the church really try to shape the cultural traditions of the populace. Instead they chase “market cues” and seek to catch the wave of trends outside of their control.

According to tourism officials, their interest in the pilgrimage began in 2002. That is, at least, when public institutions assigned salaried officials to study the phenomenon and find ways to stimulate this corner of the economy. Nestled inside a federal tourism report, we learn that in 2010 Juquila accounted for 3.5% of all Oaxacan tourist earnings (nearly 20 million USD). Oaxacan studies estimate that between 700,000 and roughly 1 million visitors (depending on the year) stayed in Juquila’s hotels every year between 2004 and 2015, and claim that they spend between 250 and 450 million pesos there annually. These figures are interesting, but officials admit that they are not counting all the pilgrims who avoid hotels. One individual simply guessed that such visitors may represent 40% of the total, but it could be more. At any rate, it appears Juquila is attracting about as many visitors as Oaxaca City itself, although not the same kind of visitors. Mulling these numbers, I asked a friend in Juquila who worked on the tourism studies. He laughed: the government doesn’t want to pay for a proper study, the hotels lie because they are underreporting their earnings, and yet the state demands numbers. In sum, many of the statistics are of dubious accuracy. This may have something to do with the discrepancies we see in the media and official documents. In any case, the state believes religious tourism represents an opportunity, so they’ve created a name and logo, “La Ruta de la Fe” (the Route of the Faith) to accompany its other “routes” targeting various tourist appetites.

At the moment, I haven’t found a recent church estimate regarding total numbers of pilgrims. What we do know is that the archdiocese championed the coronation in 2014, promoted the official celebrations aggressively, and continues to promote the devotion among Oaxacans. Juqileños note, however, that the crowning event was a great disappointment: nothing close to the numbers of devotees and dignitaries promised by the church showed up. And yet, as the shrine town’s merchants quip, the pilgrims keep coming…when it suits them.

La Libreta-The Notebook

Back in August, when I first met Don Jaime, I was amazed by his memory, intense energy, and spiral notebook. He showed me how in its pages he kept track of the exact schedule of the Coscomatepec pilgrimage. Here he stands between two support vehicles holding one of the group’s standards. (San Juanito—John the Baptist—they call him affectionately, Coscomatepec’s patron saint.) Behind him his pilgrims were sitting down to an impressive sopa de mariscos (a spicy, delicious broth chock full of whole shrimp, crab, and snapper) accompanied by stacks of tortillas, and a glass of coke or fresca. Don Jaime is adamant that everything possible to make the pilgrims comfortable takes priority. He is especially committed to everyone eating their fill, and the hearty sopa has become a tradition at their Oaxaca stop.

Although he first learned the art of pilgrimage organization as merely one of many pilgrims coordinated by devotees in Huixcolotla, Puebla, he has been leading his hometown’s group for the last 13 years. All this time he has been collecting knowledge and cultivating friends along the route. There in his libreta, the same kind carried by  mexicano school kids (and myself) we find evidence of his hard work: towns, homes, names, and the locales where supportive individuals await them with a free meal or allow them to bed down in their patio. Hence, as the image below shows, on Thursday November 10 he planned to get the group all the way to Zaachila, with a breakfast stop under Oaxaca’s Tecnológico Bridge. They would also be able to count on Paulino González for half-priced sorbet or ice cream at Siboney, a sixth generation local landmark in a town famed for its nieves.

I called him on two occasions before our rendezvous to make sure of the time and location. In each instance he assured me nothing had changed. Success depends on the group making it to their appointed rest stops and meals. Hence, at 6:53 AM I was sitting at one end of the bridge waiting. I’m sure I looked strange to the commuters filling the cars, taxis colectivos (shared cabs), peseros (minivans), and buses rumbling and buzzing through the intersection, a foreign-looking misfit, or a hopelessly lost tourist, sporting a hydration pack and floppy sun hat. I began to worry at about 8:30,  but van drivers confirmed that peregrinos were coming. First, I ran into a sizable group in matching yellow t-shirts from Texmalaquilla, Puebla who assured me they had been walking alongside colleagues from Coscomatepec. Within a few minutes, Don Jaime called, and directed me under the bridge, along the banks of the alternately bone dry or sewage-ridden Atoyac. Indeed, there I found them with their three support trucks, or rather two support trucks and one pickup to carry the Juquila peregrina in her altar. The three women running the mobile kitchen already had the sopa ready, and the pilgrims were just arriving after getting up at 3AM in Suchilquitongo, 30 km (18 miles) away.

As I would be reminded in my hiking shoes and fussy backpack walking with them for the rest of the day, these kind, welcoming folks are made of impressive, stern stuff. Relaxed and happy, they ate and rested in whatever shade they could find. They had been on the move for 8 days. A few of older men were already just riding in the trucks, their feet swollen and blistered. Others rubbed sore feet and legs, but got ready to keep going. I was only taking part in one of the easier legs on their journey, the 15 km to Zaachila…as outlined in Don Jaime’s libreta.

Anelos y sueños: Hopes and Dreams

In this photograph you can see a “petitionary offering,” an item representing what a particular individual hopes the Virgencita will help them attain. In this case, it is nestled in one the niches designed expressly for this purpose along the Pedimento’s retaining walls. Notice the misshapen clumps of clay next to it. (They are what is left of devotee offerings made from the surrounding mud that have lost their form over time.) At left, though, we have a little wooden house, purchased from one of the changarros (stands) around the chapel. Stuffed into the balcony are wads of toy money, also sold by these venders. It isn’t hard to understand what this devotee seeks. Written on the roof, it says, “Virgencita mis sueños los pondré en tus manos tengo fé en ti y que todos me lo vas a cumplir” (Virgincita I put my dreams in your hands I have faith in you and that in all of them you will come through for me).

Going to a shrine community like Juquila truly brings you to a world powered by hopes and dreams, and I mean this is both an emotional/spiritual dimension, and in the cold-hearted capitalist sense. Among many mexicanos it is a magical place where needs and desires become reality. Juquileños (individuals from Juquila) report that in other parts of Mexico people often treat them with special attention because they are from la Virgencita’s home. They get calls from friends living elsewhere asking them to arrange for special masses, because a service at Juquila guarantees better results. Locals also note that their town is relatively prosperous compared to others in the region, and they are aware that this depends on the flow of pilgrims. Such is the case that some juquileños jokingly label their town, “el norte chiquito”—the little north. This is a reference to the US, and the tendency of many Oaxacans to seek their fortune north of the boarder. Juquileños, by implication, don’t need to migrate: their fortune can be found at home.

In writing this I’m not trying to unmask a hidden cynicism. All the locals I’ve met are proudly Catholic and believe in the Virgin of Juquila’s miraculous powers, but they are also clear-eyed about the realities of their existence. In other words, the desire to profit from pilgrims is not even thinly veiled. Arriving devotees know this too. They point to the fees charged by the church, and the inflated price of water, food, and dingy hotel rooms. Locals, in turn, complain that pilgrims don’t spend enough: they camp, haul their own food and medications, and quickly exit after “visiting the Virgin.” State tourism officials have tried to “concientizar” (re-educate) hoteliers and merchants, trying to convince them that if they treated devotees better they would, perhaps, stay and spend. The response, they report: “It doesn’t matter, they keep coming.”  Of course, not all of Juquila’s venders are quite this mercenary, but there is a general tendency to charge what the “market will bear.”

Shrine economies are fascinating because, to the secularist, they seem irrational. Truth be told, however, they are no more irrational than other markets driven by desires, expectations, and beliefs that appear illogical to outsiders. For me what is fascinating and touching about the shrine space is how we can “read” the hopes and dreams in the items that are left at the shrine, and ponder their remarkable volume and small set of themes upon which they dwell. It is a central facet of the Juquila experience, especially at the Pedimento.

 

Mis respetos—Respect Due

I’ve met a few people that do bike pilgrimages. They are almost exclusively men, and although a minority of pilgrims you notice them. This weekend I travelled to Juquila to work in the parish archive. The high season for Juquila pilgrims is about to start, and I needed to see historical documents there before the staff is completely overwhelmed by visitors. I ran into these riders at the Pedimento, a chapel about a 1 hour walk from Juquila where devotees pause and make requests to the Virgin. It is an extraordinary place to visit. The ground and the trees all around this chapel are full of banners, plaques, crosses, and clay models that either convey what devotees desperately feel they need, or express gratitude for past assistance. Mostly, it is the former. In addition to the petitionary offerings, all the walls and railings around the chapel are covered with scrawled hopes, testimonials, and devout greetings.

So far this is the fastest, hardest riding group I’ve met. They are from Zacatelco, Tlaxcala and rode about 533 km (333 miles) in three days. Other groups do similar distances in a week. Once you get to Tehuacán, Puebla the ride is almost all uphill. This is only one such ride they do each year. They also peddle to another Marian shrine at San Juan de los Lagos in Jalisco (like 560 km). You couldn’t find a nicer, friendlier group of people. We talked about their trip while sharing a big bag of potato chips. They are a stripped down outfit. They stay in hotels and eat at restaurants along the way as needed, and have a single support truck that carries snacks and drinks, and stays with them in case they need repairs. In arriving at the Pedimento they had made it to the home stretch, a simple 20-minute downhill ride remained. After shooting the picture below, they saddled up and headed to the shrine. Once they’ve paid their respects to the Virgin in Juquila they will stow their bikes, get in the truck, and start the 8-hour drive home.

Imagen Peregrina – Coscomatepec’s Wandering Image

On the surface she is merely one of many copies of the Virgin of Juquila (a daughter image, if you will) found in many homes and churches. And yet this image “no tiene dueño” (she has no owner) or permanent resting place. Every November she accompanies the pilgrims from the pueblos surrounding Coscomatepec, Veracruz as they make their way to the shrine in Oaxaca. Secured in a custom-designed, cedar, pick-up-truck altar the copy travels to the original. When they are on the road, she accompanies them. At the end of the day, she waits at the designated resting place and when they  arrive each pilgrim passes touching her glass-and-wood case reverently, do the sign of the cross, kiss their hand before seeking out a spot to relax. When they arrive at the shrine the pilgrims take her down, and carry her into the basilica. It is simple and fitting: the devotion is very much about ritual movement and their image goes with them. But the symbolism is actually more complex.

On one level, she represents the expansion of this particular pilgrimage devotion and a devotee support network. Don Jaime (the Coscomatepec pilgrimage’s organizer) first walked with devotees from Huixcolotla, Puebla, and when he decided to start his own group his poblano friends gave them this image. Thus she stands for the transfer of custom and knowledge between pilgrims.  Over the years she has also come to embody the ties between devotees in the pueblos around Coscomatepec. When I interviewed Don Jaime he suggested we meet at Doña Cami’s house where this photograph was taken.  The image was on display in what North Americans might call a carport or covered patio. As they explained, when she is not travelling to Juquila she is going from one house to the next across the entire region. She had been at Doña Cami’s for a week or so, and the next day she headed to another devotee’s house 35 km away in Colonia Manuel González, where she was again given pride of place as shown below. And so it goes all year long. At each stage, devotees gather, recite the Rosary, and then travel together to her next temporary home. The proud new hosts greet the image and guests with more prayers and a modest celebration; some soda and tamales in this instance.

As scholars might characterize it, what we have is an array of “meaningful movements,” exchanges, and social bonds. If we think of the Virgin of Juquila as a stationary magnet drawing pilgrims from a large geographic area, this copy does a different job. She travels a smaller region sustaining the ties between the communities who participate collectively in the pilgrimage. As Don Jaime notes, that bulk of his fellow sojourners come from the smaller communities where the imagen peregina takes up temporary residence. He also muses that someday she will travel the United States. He is fully certain that Juquilita will make sure there are no problems crisscrossing the border and getting back in time for Coscomatepec’s annual pilgrimage.

 

Peregrinos on the Move

They are on their way. They’ve been on the move for a couple of days already. Coscomatepec Veracruz’s annual 14-day, 500 km, walking pilgrimage to the shrine of Our Lady of Juquila in Oaxaca is winding its way along roads and pathways for the 14^th year in a row. I spoke to the group’s leader, Don Jaime, this morning (November 3, 2016) and he confirmed that they were right on schedule, past Orizaba and closing in on Ciudad Mendoza. I will meet them on November 10^th on as they pause for breakfast in Oaxaca. Don Jaime and his fellow sojourners are helping me understand the dynamics of the burgeoning Juquila pilgrimage, and this vibrant cultural practice in Mexico today. We have no way of knowing how many people take part, but estimates indicate that is flourishing. In terms of Juquila, sources suggest that some 2.5 million people visit every year. Most arrive via buses and cars. But many make the trip on bikes, in running relays, or walking, enlivening the roads leading to the shrine with their banners, standards, matching t-shirts, and flower-festooned pick-up-truck altars carrying each group’s copy of the Virgin of Juquila. Some number in the 100s and have crews of support personnel taking care of food preparation, medical attention, and the vehicles bearing luggage and food.

Not all Mexican Catholics express their faith this way.  There are class divisions, clearly. You do not find too many wealthy or middle-class Mexicans braving the sweaty crowds at popular religious festivals with their standing-room-only masses, down market venders, and carnival atmospheres. It is a truly a distinct, very public way of being Catholic. Millions of Mexicans find it very meaningful, and many others value this kind of devotional commitment even if they haven’t taken part. Some individuals may rarely attend Sunday mass, but make time for pilgrimage. It is hard to gauge its national impact, but it resides deep within Mexico’s cultural sinews. If you could pull back and map all the different pilgrimage devotions in Mexico and chart their feast days, you would see a net-like system of interweaving of routes and a year-round flow of different groups knitting together the national territory. There is a social network dimension that accompanies each and every pilgrimage too. Devotees do not take off on them blindly. Years of cultivating and maintaining contacts in towns along the way precede the annual journeys. If you keep digging, you often see a dense web of ties related to local commerce linking the devotees and their supporters across the distances too.

Don Jaime, a hale bearded man in his late 50s, gave me this picture taken during a previous year when we first spoke in August. He has been making the journey for 18 years straight: first as a member of another town’s pilgrimage while he studied the route and learned how to organize his own group. He dreams of rounding out his years as a pilgrim at 25, completing “mis bodas de plata” (my silver anniversary).  In the picture you see Coscomatepec’s standard bearers. The two Virgin of Juquila standards always go in front. San Juan Bautista, Coscomatepec’s patron saint always brings up the rear.

Images and More Images

 

The first time I started thinking about the pilgrimage to Our Lady of Juquila it was because of the “stuff”–what scholars  call “material culture.”  Catholic pilgrimages are complicated: at the center we find the famed miraculous image, but alongside them we also find an array of items deployed as offerings, decor, and adornments. Another way to think about it is that there is a lot of staging in theses settings. There is also, typically, a steady flow of souvenirs that devotees take home. Back in 2001 when I was working  in Oaxaca City’s Archdiocesan Archive, I was astounded by all the wads of old receipts for the parish of Santa Catarina de Juquila (a small town now, then just a village). From the 1860s to 1900s they itemize hiring musicians, painters, carpinters, printers, candlemakers, and fireworks technicians. The priests running the shrine also purchased thousands of prints featuring Our Lady Juquila, ranging from small, pocket-sized, to large, full-page. Sometimes they ordered them printed on red paper. In the archive I imagined them being hauled to the shrine in thick stacks, and then being dispersed one-by-one from Juquila all over the region in the hands of devotees. I have a faded, slightly blurry, 3 x 5 inch, Juquila from this era in a no-frills, tin-and-glass frame with a tightly braided loop of brown string attached to the top. I purchased it in a flea market in Puebla, and I’ve wondered who it belonged to and where it was hanging as it faded.

The image above is the contemporary equivalent, in a way. It is a Virgin of Juquila t-shirt design. Anyone can take it and have it applied to a shirt, or something else. You don’t even have to go to the shrine. I like how it speaks to an old phenomenon, the perpetual reproduction and mobility of images. In fact, in its repetition it  shouts a multicolored “Juquila, Juquila, Juquila…!” It is a representation that says “reproduce me.” It is both traditional and innovative. Beyond the fact that it features four images, the version of Juquila used is almost identical to the old prints from the 1800s. But then these camiseta Juquilas are like power ranger virgencitas, and they are meant to be displayed together. What represents a more modern identity statement than the t-shirt? It is casual and cool and personal.  They speak for us, and travel with us, on the street, into buildings, and wherever else we wander. We can produce them in bulk. Wearing this you are announcing your tie to Juquila and Oaxaca. You are identifying with her and other devotees. She is with you…until you change your shirt.