Brothers of Light

In New Mexico, during Lent and Holy Week each year, the Penitent Brotherhood enacts a primitive Passion Play, which in its traditional ritual of self-torture represents a curious survival of the Middle Ages. Much lurid journalism has been devoted to the Penitentes, but in this sympathetic account by Alice Corbin Henderson, an eyewitness, the ceremonies are presented in their true aspect, with the historic background and reason for the survival clearly indicated. From this it appears that the religious custom of self-inflicted penance was introduced into the Southwest as early as 1598 by the Franciscan priests who accompanied Don Juan de Oñate and his soldiers and colonists on their way to the permanent settlement of the province of New Mexico-originally embracing all of our present Southwest. From that day the customs then inaugurated have been traditionally observed by the humble descendants of the "Conquistadores."