Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Easter Mass - The Savior Has Landed

I went with another Peace Corps friend of mine to Easter Mass; I really wanted to get a feel for the Filipino style (or any style for that matter) Easter mass. I have read that Filipinos practice a medieval-style Catholicism and I thought this could be a really good experience to see it. My friend was raised Catholic and she did a really good job of describing the motions of the service, telling me what American Catholics practice and what seemed unique to the Philippines.
As she was describing communion to me, I looked over to my right and saw a girl standing in line next to me, waiting for communion, staring. I wasn't alarmed or anything because being stared at by Filipinos in rural areas is entirely commonplace. But as the line proceeded on towards the altar, she didn't budge for a good 20 seconds.
"You see that?" I asked my friend.
I tried to put it out of my mind, shake it off as another weird experience. I had almost forgotten about it by the time the service ended. As my friend and I left the church, we noticed that same girl was following us, but from a distance.
We hurriedly picked up the pace home and she kept the same distance behind us the entire time, meeting our pace quite obviously. She had her hand hidden from view inside her raincoat and that made me really nervous. She was staring me down the entire way.
We began to run, as did she, all the way home. We got inside the door and, as my friend and I closed it together, we felt resistance from the other side. She was trying to get through the door! The girl started to yell, "he is the Lord, he is the Lord! Father, I must embrace him!" That's what I got out of it anyway, it was all in Visayan.
We finally heaved on the door and pushed her out, locked it and called the police. Before the police arrived, she stood staring into the window.
The police escorted her away and she has not been seen since. Crazy mixed-up kid.

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