What is the Holy Ghost? And Other Questions about Easter and Semana Santa I couldn’t Answer
One of my dearest friends came to visit me after a 3 year delay due to Covid. It is Semana Santa here in Spain this week so we decided to descend from my mountain village and brave the big city of Granada to see what Easter is all about here.
Because of the pandemic, Semana Santa events had been canceled for two years but this year they were back!
Neither my friend nor I are very religious but while she had been raised in a Muslim country, I had nominally been raised Christian so I was the closest thing we had to an Easter expert. I got off to a good start when she asked “What is the Holy Trinity?”
I confidently answered, “The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost”. Then she stumped me,
“What is the Holy Ghost?”
I thought about it for a second and then, offered up; the ghost of Jesus? I don’t know, hold on, I’ll just consult Google.
After several very confusing answers I found a sight that said it answered religious questions for teenagers. That seemed about my speed even though I am in my 50s.
So, as far as I can gather, the Holy Ghost is kinda sorta the love that exists between the Father and the Son. It is the spirit of the religion that enters into people, it is not so much the spirit of a person as the spirit of God that is within all of us.
She was a little confused, as was I, but she was satisfied enough to ask another question.
What is the difference between Good Friday and Easter Sunday?
I knew this one a little bit but then doubted myself. Good Friday is when Jesus died and Sunday is when he rose again. But wait a minute, why would the day Jesus died be called “good”? Maybe it is the reverse, because wouldn’t good be when he rose up? And if He came back to life, did He die again?
It turns out that back in the day, “good” meant holy so, Good Friday actually means Holy Friday.
Also, He didn’t die twice, 40 days after he was resurrected, he ascended to heaven.
OK, now we had the basics of Easter down but the celebrations in Spain were totally different than what I am familiar with in the United States.
In Spain, the celebration takes an entire week, not just Sunday. There are no eggs, bunnies or baskets involved. Instead, there are processions. People carry massive floats with the Virgin Mary and Jesus on the cross around the city.
The floats I saw were covered in candles and were accompanied by women wearing black and people in tall coned outfits with holes cut out for the eyes. They look disconcertingly like costumes worn by racist organizations in the United States but I was assured they had nothing to do with that.
Then came my friend’s final question.
“Why are they wearing cones on their heads.”
I had no idea, but this time I didn’t feel bad about not knowing, I had never seen anything like this before either.
Another friend explained to me the next day that the people wearing the cones were the penitents. The cones were to hide their identities as they were ashamed of something they had done and were atoning.
So, at the end of the day, I realized that in spite of attending Sunday school for at least 6 months in my teens, I have a lot to learn even about the religion I am most familiar with. I don’t even know what I don’t know in other religions.
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