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Arriving at Guanajuato's Templo de la Compañía is always a strange
experience. It's a church connected to the former Jesuit seminary,
which is now the University of Guanajuato. It sits on one corner of an
intersection diagonally across from the main Post Office and faces the
Casa del Agua hotel.
I stopped in front of the church's main
entrance and made note of the serape-covered very dark-skinned
indigenous woman who has been sitting there for as long as I've been
living in Guanajuato. She is dressed exactly the same, is covered with
the same blanket, and is in the exact same squatting pose with always
the same gnarled hand cupped for a handout. I've wondered throughout
the years whether she's actually a ceramic sculpture with a coin slot
in her raised hand as a moneymaker for the church. This time I checked
- no slot. I find this strange beyond words but then strangeness is
what describes so much of the Mexican experience.
I walked into
the church in a heightened state of curiosity. The last time I was in
this church, spring of 2006, I was reviewing it for a book project. At
that time, the small gallery behind the main altar was being remodeled
and was not open to the public. Now, in October of 2008, the gallery
was open again and I was eager to take a look.
An issue I
reported on in 2006 in my book was the surprising and shocking
discovery that pigeons, and not just a few, lived in the church. On
this current visit, I wanted to see if the pigeons were still in
residence in this historically significant Colonial Mexican church.
In
1737, the "Religious Process," no doubt a mystical procedure, was
completed to establish the congregation. The construction of the church
began in 1747 due to the generous donations of the mind-bogglingly rich
Señora Maria Josefa Teresa de Busto y Moya and her son, José Joaquin de
Sardaneta y Legaspi. There is a portrait of the son in the church's
gallery. He bears an uncanny and frightening resemblance to Truman
Capote.
The church's construction was initiated under the
supervision of architect Fray (friar) José de la Cruz. Later, the
construction was put into the hands of the renowned architect Felipe de
Ureña.
I have to say that I love this church. The sheer
spaciousness of the main sanctuary is most appealing. The church is
53.5 meters long by 28.5 meters wide. Some regard the church as one of
the best representations of the "evolution" of the Churrigueresque
style in Mexico.
The façade of the church has been undergoing
restoration for the last few years. The work, as is typical in Mexico,
goes on and on and on with no end in sight.
The church's interior
has three huge naves and eight columns. Four of the columns are made of
very fine green quarry stone. Each nave has small, colored windows.
Unfortunately, some of the panes are broken and the church has not had
the money to replace them. As you probably have guessed, it is through
these broken panes that the pigeons come and go.
I can recall
with frightening clarity my first visit to this church. I saw many fine
paintings and religious icons, some of which are museum-quality. Many
were splotched with pigeon ca-ca. I remember hearing the peeping of
baby pigeons from their nests perched high in the rafters. The parents
were coming and going through wind-blown holes in the nave's
multicolored windows.
Well, in 2008, the pigeon problem has not
improved. There are still lots of pigeons swooping over the
parishioners' heads and perching on the ledges high above.
The
common pigeons you see in parks all over the world are actually called
Rock Doves. They are amazingly adaptive birds that can live almost
anywhere and it is these that have infested the church. They love to
perch as high as they can on rocks, on building ledges, in trees, and
on fountains. If they see a hole in a wall, a broken church window, or
an open door, they are likely to go in.
The Rock Dove, or pigeon
(the words are synonymous), is not indigenous to North America, Central
America, or South America. Many people are surprised to learn that the
multicolored, clown-like, park-infesting pigeon is from western and
southern Europe. They can range into Africa and southern Asia.
These
clever little birds show their intelligence by the extent to which they
can survive. And, surviving they were. While I sat in the church and
contemplated the architecture, I saw a pair of pigeons having sex on
top of Jesus' head on the main altar's crucifix. Afterwards, they made
pigeon poo-poo all over the crucifix.
By the way, in case you are
wondering how the Rock Dove got to the New World, it was the fault of
the French. In 1609, the French thought it would be cool to create a
plague of pigeons that would infest every city in the New World. They
not only infest the parks, they have taken up residence in a few
hundred Spanish colonial churches all over Mexico. Now, I don't know if
that was their actual motive, but it is what has happened. All the
pigeons, or Rock Doves, you see in a park (or church) near you come
from the original stock the French imported into Nova Scotia in 1609.
I
was curious about what the parishioners thought about the pigeon
problem and how they protected themselves from being bombed by pigeon
poop during Mass. Do they use umbrellas? Does the priest look out on a
sea of rain slicker-clad church parishioners? Do they put a tarp above
the pews? I just had to find out, so I went around and asked everyone I
saw.
The first person I talked to was a very nice woman whose job
it was to clean the pigeon doodies from the church. Taking the
opportunity to rest a bit from her toil, she gave me the immediate
impression that she was immensely satisfied that someone recognized the
impossible task of keeping on top of the pigeon mess. She wasn't sure
why no one had come up with the idea of replacing the broken
windowpanes or at least covering the openings with wire mesh to keep
the pigeons out. She said (and this was confirmed by the second person
I interviewed) that the pigeons create a huge problem during Mass and
other services, especially weddings. I cannot begin to imagine what it
must be like to attend a church service, wearing your best Sunday suit
or new Easter bonnet, while hoards of pigeons fly overhead and rain
poop down.
The first time I visited this church, workers were
removing the golden crowns off of a statue of Mary holding the Baby
Jesus. Apparently, a family of pigeons had taken up residence inside
the crowns. The damage defied description. On this visit, I was happy
to see that the crowns had been cleaned and replaced and the statue was
again in pristine condition.
The corrosiveness of pigeon
excrement is unquestionable as is the public heath issue. In addition
to causing serious damage to buildings, they are associated with human
illnesses such as Psittacosis-a potentially fatal flu-like disease;
Meningitis-though unlikely, it is found in the nests;
Salmonella-sometimes fatal; Mites and Fleas; Rats-attracted to the nest
to prey on the baby pigeons; Aggravated breathing problems including
asthma.
The second goal I had for this visit was a more
delightful discovery. The former sacristy, located behind the main
altar, had been remodeled and was again open to the public. The door
leading to the gallery is to the left of the main altar and up a few
steps. Though not terribly impressive, I'm happy to report the total
absence of pigeons in this area. I don't know how they keep the pigeons
from entering the gallery from the main sanctuary. There is a person
posted at the door to take the $10 peso entrance fee. Perhaps part of
the job is to do pigeon guard duty. There are a few windows in the
gallery, but all are intact and all are covered with tight netting.
Though
the artists of many of the paintings in the gallery are unknown, there
are some paintings by Juan Patricio Morlete, Baltazar Echave Oreo, and
Miguel Cabrera. The artists won't have to worry from the grave that
their neoclassical, tequitqui, and vice-royal period paintings in the
new gallery have become pigeon toilets.
I asked both employees in the church what they thought should be done about the pigeon problem.
"Saque las palomas." - "Remove the pigeons."
"¿Pero como?" - "But how?" I asked.
They shrugged their shoulders, in typical Mexican fashion, and asked,
"¿Quién sabe?" - "Who knows?"
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Bower's new book, A Walk Through Mexico's Crown Jewel: A Guanajuato Travelogue Unlimited Publishing, is available now THIS LINK.
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