Running the Marathon

Last Friday I was driving back from the morning commute to Los Charcos (school) when I saw an amazing thing. The official title was "Maraton de Peregrinos 2º" which means means second annual marathon of pilgrims. I saw this religious procession the day after Betty´s post concerning the beige and mauve color scheme proposed for her beloved church. Betty, how I wish you had seen this procession of the faithful. The beginning of the marathon was a pick-up truck, Ford F150 with brown and yellow paint, in the back underneath a blue plastic tarp was the altar. Altars here have essential components; the Mexican flag, candles lit, flowers and of course, Virgen de Guadalupe (THE Queen of Mexico, dontcha know). The rainbow of colors and the simple beauty of this mobile altar made me sit, wait and watch. My next sight was a woman in a bright blue track suit running with a torch.

I was only half way through my mug of delicious black tea from Rwanda (thank you ´becca!) so immediately I said "What is going on?" Sometimes it´s hard to put all the pieces together in Mexico as an outsider, without the advantage of ample caffeination. Gradually I connected all the dots, translated all the signs into my English dominant brain and saw the herd of silver, pink and blue buses headed my way. (Travel note in Mexico: if you see lots of buses going the way you need to go, pull out quick and get ahead of them or sit for an hour and wait, I decided to pull out, quick!) I made it to nearly the front of the marathon and watched as people jumped from the moving bus, in front of me, to stand their place in line on this torch passing marathon of a pilgrimage.

Watching the people jump from the bus made me think, good Lord that is so not safe and then I thought of Duffy again. You are right, religion has become so safe. In the effort not to "offend" there is a diluted haziness of religiosity. What I saw was this beautiful explosion of movement and color in honor of God. Isn´t that religion? A Faith that moves you and takes you out of the realm of your cozy life? Good God it was a beautiful moment! There was no "blandness...(of) appearance or message" that day. I watched as these pilgrims ran the marathon for God, passing the torch from one to the next, because life is with people and spreading the message isn´t it? That is where I bow down on my knees, though I can´t commit to the Pilgrims God, I can commit to their faith. There is something larger than me, something Divine and I get the message daily: this life is great, this life is good...run the marthon. And so I am.