La Palma - Religion

Religion

The island is predominately Catholic and since 1676, has been known for the festival of "La Bajada de la Virgen de las Nieves" (The bringing down of the virgin of the snow, Candelaria), which has a rich history, from the time of the Bishop of the Canaries, Bartolomé García Ximénez. The festival features the dancing of "enanos" or midgets. The costumes that people wear have a hole at the top of the hat to allow them to see out, while giving the appearance of dancing midgets. People come from all over the world for the celebration which happens every five years. The image of the virgin is taken down from her sanctuary and paraded around the city with the festival lasting nearly two weeks before she is returned.

Each island has a patron saint and "Virgen de las Nieves" (The virgin of the snow) is the patron saint of La Palma. Many women on the island have the name "Nieves" in honor of this.

Read more about this topic:  La Palma

Famous quotes containing the word religion:

    Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant and the rule of law under God is acknowledged.
    Ronald Reagan (b. 1911)

    Whitman is like a human document, or a wonderful treatise in human self revelation. It is neither art nor religion nor truth: Just a self revelation of a man who could not live, and so had to write himself.
    —D.H. (David Herbert)

    All Protestantism, even the most cold and passive, is a sort of dissent. But the religion most prevalent in our northern colonies is a refinement on the principle of resistance; it is the dissidence of dissent, and the Protestantism of the Protestant religion.
    Edmund Burke (1729–1797)