It's hard to believe, but Chris and I have come to the end of week 3 here in Guadalajara, the official halfway point of our summer in Mexico, to mark the occasion Chris and I made a special weekend trip, but more on that later. On Tuesday the students at CIRIMEX (our language school) participated for the 3rd time in a mass and procession to mark the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, this after already celebrating on Thursday and Friday. This time we celebrated the Solemnity at the Archdiocesan Seminary here in Guadalajara. Every year they have their own mass and procession the Tuesday after the Thursday of Corpus as an event to invite family and friends to as well as to gather the entire seminary (both major and minor) community. Usually the Cardinal Archbishop presides, but alas this year he was in Rome to attend festivities for the closing of the Year for Priests, a worthy exemption indeed. In his place, the seminary Rector, who also happens to be an auxiliary bishop presided with 3 of the other auxiliary bishops con-celebrating, one of whom gave the homily. It sounded like a good homily to me, but then again I caught maybe a word or two a sentence. However the highlight was the procession after the mass. There were three extremely elaborate altars set up, each by one of the respective seminary communities (the philosophers, the theologians, and the minor seminarians). These altars would put just about any altar in the US to shame. For being temporary, two of them were close to 30 feet high and one of them had large depictions of the sacred hearts of Jesus and Mary, complete with blood (dyed water) running from their sides. The altars also all had elaborate "carpets" set up in front of them to welcome the blessed sacrament. There were created by packing together dyed sawdust to make some pretty elaborate pictures (again pictures to come one I get back to ND and find my camera cable). Alas yours truly was extremely impressed, it was an amazing way to spend a morning (not to mention we got to skip class for it). On another liturgical note this Friday was the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Patronal Feast Day of the Holy Cross Priests. It was a school day so there was not much partying to be done, however Chris and I did find some time to celebrate with mass (of course), some adoration, and a trip to Dairy Queen (it was after all a Holy Cross Feast Day).
The other major event of the week was a little cultural field trip that Chris and I made on Saturday to mark our halfway point. The town of Tequila is just a 45 minute ride away from Guadalajara and there are more than a few groups in Guadalajara that offer tours of Tequila. Chris and I caught the tour bus at a local hotel and it took us first to a farm (owned by the Cuervo company) where Agave plants (the base for Tequila) are grown. There we had a demonstration by a Jimador (an agave farmer) on how agave is planted and then harvested and prepared for making Tequila. I have to admit that this was actually pretty fascinating (more so for me than Chris) as the tools required include a 3 foot machete and a 6 foot (height) spade with a ridiculously sharp end called a Coa:
After seeing how Agave was harvested, we went into the town of Tequila to see how it is distilled into that lovely drink. We took a tour of the Jose Cuervo factory (complete with a few tastings and complimentary margarita) to see how these Agave hearts are transformed by heat, yeast, and a bit of time, into Tequila. Needless to say, a good time was had. Even better the tour ended just on time for Chris and I to head over to a resturant for lunch, which was tasty, and watch the US-England soccer game. Given the general animosity towards the US soccer team by Mexicans (a sports thing, not an international relations things), we might have been the only US fans in the restaurant. On the way home we stopped by another, more local, Tequila factory, where you guessed it, we had some more Tequila. It seemed like a pretty good way to mark our halfway point.
The upcoming week holds some equal promise, the school is taking us to the neighboring city of Zapopan to take in the sights there and if Chris and I can get our act together, we should be in Mexico City for the weekend. On top of all this, Fr. Aaron Michka is coming down on Sunday to spend a few days down here, it will certainly be a blast to have him around.
That's about all for now. Hopefully there will be another post in about a weeks time. Until then adios.
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