Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2019. 138 pp. US$68.00, cloth. ISBN 978-0-8248-7997-6.
Pain is meaningful. This is the resounding assertion that Julius Bautista makes in The Way of the Cross: Suffering Selfhoods in the Roman Catholic Philippines. He does so by paying attention to Passion rituals in Pampanga, a province that attracts a vast number of spectators during Holy Week. Extensive chapters are devoted to the following rituals: the pabasa (“in which groups of people endure long hours of continuous chanting Christ’s Passion story”); the pagdarame (“in which hundreds of people self-flagellate onto open wounds on their backs as they go on a walking journey around the province”); and the pamamaku king krus (“in which steel nails are driven through the palms and feet of ritual practitioners”) (1).
In a manner that can only draw on deep ethnographic work, Bautista reveals that for those who participate in them, these rituals evoke “a kind of intimacy with God,” one “that places them and their loved ones in the best position to receive His divine favor in this life, here and now” (1). Therefore, at the heart of the suffering self is a desire for ginhawa, a release from tribulations that effect the self and a loved one. That pain encapsulates a person’s relationships with God and fellow sufferers in view of a divine release is what it makes it a meaningful experience for the suffering self. This only goes to show that being involved in these rituals is about neither seeking forgiveness nor withstanding pain to gain salvation. The book is therefore a nuanced counterpoint to these misguided commentaries that abound about Passion rituals and their participants.
At the same time, the suffering self is not just an individual entity. This is another significant insight. Invoking the anthropological concept of “dividuals,” Bautista underscores how the suffering self is embedded in relationships—with Christ and the community of sufferers. He explains this concept in detail in the epilogue, but it is also well illustrated and theorized throughout the book. The ritual of pagdarame is worth highlighting. Literally, pagdarame is to sympathize, but locals employ it to refer to self-flagellation. Refuting depictions of self-flagellation as a ritual of atonement, Bautista demonstrates that participating as a magdarame (flagellant) involves a triangulated mode of empathy. Specifically, his empathy is extended to Christ and a loved one, both as suffering entities. In relation to Christ, the magdarame is both an empathizer to the former’s suffering (the Passion) and a supplicant for his divine work. In relation to the loved one, the magdarame is an intermediary, deeply moved by the former’s medical condition. Flagellants are thus “empowered to facilitate ritual intentions even while they channel a vulnerable position” (53).
Among the most courageous feats of The Way of the Cross is its direct engagement with clerical attitudes. Indeed, denouncement is most common among high-ranking church officials, who are often the ones interviewed in the media. But the book judiciously points out that this is not a monolithic disposition. Apparently, accommodation is also common especially among community-based ministers, some of whom are even willing to welcome flagellants to their own premises. In the words of one pastoral custodian, “I’ve not seen Catholics pray as intensely as that flagellant prayed” (92).
There is of course a pastoral implication here, one that is beyond the intended purpose of the book. Even so, this point needs to be underscored since scholarly writings on religion in the Philippines end up being read by ministers and other faith-based workers. Given the divergent perspectives among the clergy, Bautista’s empirical data might be useful in helping them formulate a more pastorally sensitive approach to popular devotion. The theological concepts of inculturation (discussed in chapter 5) and mortification (in chapter 1) are particularly relevant as points of departure. At the same time, while the book does not cover them, the causes and contexts of people’s sufferings are inseparable from the Passion rituals themselves. They are sites of pastoral reflections as much as they are of anthropological interpretations.
By revisiting the place of pain in Christian life, Bautista’s work is a significant contribution to the study of contemporary religion in the Philippines. First, it is to demonstrate that people’s aversion to pain misses out on its religious significance for the participants of Passion rituals. He rightly points out that this aversion derives from both medicine and theology. Medical progress has rendered pain a human tribulation that must be alleviated. At the same time, the theology embraced by the church hierarchy treats these Passion rituals as a “soteriological redundancy” in view of Christ’s own suffering on the cross (2). Second, it relocates pain from the domain of theology, which dominates the study of religion in the country, to the anthropology of religion. If offers a fresh view of the suffering self, but one that is less about salvation than it is about shared well-being in the here and now.
I end by highlighting how The Way of the Cross must also be a welcome reminder to other scholars of contemporary religion in the Philippines. Some might insist that the study of Passion rituals in the country has already become repetitive. Following this line of thinking, scholars must thus turn to other contemporary forms of the Filipino religious life. But the reality is that rituals of suffering endure throughout the country. In other words, while there are indeed new—and spectacular—Christian expressions that celebrate prosperity and growth, pain remains. And in many ways, the Passion rituals Bautista presents to us allude to the suffering of ordinary Catholics, whose experiences are either dismissed or rendered as spectacle. Confronting these dispositions, Bautista reclaims the meaningfulness of pain. This once again is a testament to the complexity of Christianity in the Philippines, to which The Way of the Cross leads its readers.
Jayeel Cornelio
Ateneo de Manila University, Quezon City