After his
immersion, all the inhabitants, men, women and children, make a rush
to be the first to dip in the "blessed water," for, by doing this,
all their sins are forgiven them for a year to come.
The sick are
careful to see that they are not left in the position of the
unfortunate one mentioned in the Gospel by John, who "had no one to
put him into the pool."
I have also known the Virgin solemnly carried down to the water's
edge, that she might command it to rise or fall, as suited the
convenience of the people. While she exercised her power the natives
knelt around her on the shingly beach in rapturous devotion. At such
times the "Mother of Heaven" is clothed in her best, and the jewels
in her costume sparkle in the tropical sun.
What the Nile is to Egypt, the Paraguay River is to these interior
lands, and what Isis was to the Egyptians, so is the Virgin to these
people. Once, when the waters were low, it is related the Virgin came
down from heaven and stood upon some rocks in the river bed. To this
day the pilot tells you how her footprints are to be clearly seen,
impressed in the stone, when the water is shallow. Strange that
Mahomet does not rise from his tomb and protest, for that miracle we
must concede to him, because his footprints have been on the sacred
rocks at Mecca for a thousand years. Does he pass it over, believing,
with many, that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?
Whatever Roman Catholicism is in other parts of the world, in South
America it is pure Mariolatry. The creed, as we have seen, reads:
"Mary must be our first object of worship, Saint Joseph the second."
Along with these, saints, living and dead, are numberless.
A traveller in South Brazil thus writes of a famous monk: "There, in
a shed at the back of a small farm, half sitting, half reclining on a
mat and a skin of some wild animal, was a man of about seventy years
of age, in a state of nudity. A small piece of red blanket was thrown
over his shoulders, barely covering them. His whole body was
encrusted with filth, and his nails had grown like claws. His vacant
look showed him to be a poor, helpless idiot. Beside him a large wood
fire was kept burning. The ashes of this fire, strewn around him for
the sake of cleanliness, are carried away for medicinal purposes by
the thousands of pilgrims who visit him. Men and women come from long
distances to see him, in the full persuasion that he is a holy man
and has miraculous powers." [Footnote: "The Neglected Continent"]
Romanism is thus seen to be in a double sense "a moral pestilence."
The church is, of course, very much in evidence in Corumba, for it is
a very religious place.
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