Cultural Dependence

Have you missed me? It’s been a busy few weeks. I went to Germany and even had an email account hacked. And how about the whole Balloon Boy fiasco? Richard and Mayumi Heene are awful but the media did not help the matter. Why report on real news when there’s live footage of a boy hurtling through the sky in a UFO-esque contraption, most likely on the way to his death? Veracity is secondary, it’s the story, what we think we see or want to see. Do we really want to see a tragedy involving a kid? What do you see?

In Oakdale, California, David Nunez’s father excavated a “football-sized rock” ornamented with what the two men saw as an image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, according to this Boston Herald story. Of course, “the caramel-brown and chalkboard black hunk of gneiss, a banded metamorphic rock that started out as sandstone and shale” dates back millions and millions of years. This shape was created around the same time as the Sierra Nevada Mountains, way before humans and human stories spawned. Merced College humanities professor Max Hallman gets it: "Culturally, people in India may have seen a Hindu goddess on it. If you’ve never heard of the Virgin of Guadalupe, you wouldn’t have seen it. Visions are culturally dependent.”



What then, Professor, can we deduce about the culture of Braehead, Scotland, where the purported image of Christ has been spotted on the bathroom door of an Ikea? According to this Telegraph UK report, visitors to the men’s room see Jesus and Gandolf. As such Madonna of the Toast stories go all of this is pretty standard. Here comes the curveball: the Ikea claims that the face is intentional, and meant to portray Benny Anderson of ABBA. As a spokeswoman said: “Swedishness is engrained in every part of our stores."

I love it when corporate branding and national identity mingle, especially when some late 1970s pop music joins the mix . . .

I'm Not the Only One Thinking About This Stuff

Straight out of Stockton, California: a Virgin of Guadalupe rock. Jamie Garcia had hit rock bottom (get it?), having lost his family because of his excessive drinking. While working construction, according to this CBS 13 report, Garcia found the rock pictured above and immediately felt that his life had changed. He quit his vices and grew closer with his wife and kids. Garcia believes the image to be that of the Virgin of Guadalupe with Juan Diego looking up at Her. Garcia goes on to say that he has been offered $80,000 for the rock, “but he refused, saying it’s priceless.” That’s something you say when you’re offered $100 for one of grandma’s old baubles, or you're mimicking one of those credit card commercials. If the story is true I guess credit (I'm on fire today with the wordplay, no?) has to be given to Garcia for not selling out.

If you’re a regular in these parts and have already read and re-read Madonna of the Toast you might be interested in this tongue-in-cheek perspective from the Contra Costa Times, which riffs on a Jesus ultrasound (different from the one I mentioned last post). Here’s an excerpt:

As I have two biological children, according to the last time I counted, I have some experience in trying to decipher ultrasound images. It's not easy. One minute you think you're looking at a little thumb, the next the doctor tells you that thumb is really a spleen. I once thought my daughter's ultrasound actually showed a squadron of Russian fighter planes attacking Dublin and tried to call the authorities. You just never know — it could happen.

Though seeing Jesus in there could be just as startling. I'm sure Mary and Joseph had the same reaction when they got their first three-dimensional ultrasound at Bethlehem Ultrasound and Donkey Feed.

Until next time . . .

A Thought About the Virgin of Guadalupe

When I first started kicking around the idea of writing Madonna of the Toast, about three years ago, one of the things that really got me jazzed was the fact that people see secular icons as well as religious ones. It really drove home for me the power of the image to influence people and their interpretations of the physical world that we all inhabit. With that said, and as regular visitors to this blog know, most of the iconography spotted on trees and foodstuffs is religious, and most of these sightings are of Jesus and the Virgin Mary. The creation and dissemination of the visual representations of both of these figures over time canvases the world and while variations of how they looked exist, both icons can be recognized by shapes and shadings that echo the most common aspects of the images, like a flowing gown and facial hair.



Many people think these phenomena are new, resulting from our digital, screen-dependent culture, and this is just plain wrong. Our high-speed technological landscape certainly helps promote these sightings and spread the word about them, but such visual manifestations have surfaced for centuries. As I mention in the book, references to the Man in the Moon can be found in texts from Europe and Asia that date back at least 500 years.

December 12 marks the Feast of the Virgin of Guadalupe, which is inspired by the story of Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin’s walk up a hill called Tepeyac in 1531, not too far from Mexico City. The story states that the Virgin appeared before Juan Diego, telling him to build an abbey on the hill. Juan Diego relayed the message to a Spanish bishop who needed to observe a miracle to be convinced. In response to the bishop’s request, the Virgin told Juan Diego to gather flowers, although it was winter and nothing was in bloom. However, atop Tepeyac, Juan Diego found roses, which he gathered and presented to the bishop, after which the Virgin’s form appeared on the cloth of Juan Diego’s tilma (cloak). This story is believed to be an amalgamation of Catholic ideology and indigenous Mexican lure, particularly that of the goddess Tonantzin. Since the 16th century, the Virgin of Guadalupe has been used as a symbol of Mexican independence.

I couldn’t help consider the roots of this myth after reading this article in the Los Angeles Times about the appeal of the Virgin of Guadalupe to people with cultural and religious heritages that span the globe. According to the article, “An estimated 10,000 devotees turned out Sunday [December 2] for a procession in honor of the Virgin, among them ethnic Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Tongan and Vietnamese worshipers.” The story of this visual manifestation compels people from all walks of life in a way that seems more about sharing a personal touchstone, as opposed to dogma, allowing these people to celebrate diversity and individuality under the guise of a single iconic image.



It's true that people may look a little too hard for these images, or try too hard to convince others that a holy sign is embedded somewhere surprising (like in this eBay item claiming to display the images of Mary and Jesus wound into Mother Teresa's fingerprint). But by the very virtue of these stories and ideas existing, they are important and worth examining, because they reveal a great deal about the culture at large: our tendencies, weaknesses and desires. And in considering what so many others claim to see, it really boils down to this: What do you see?

Dead Insects and the Virgin Mary

It’s not too hard to believe that another Virgin Mary has appeared in Texas. Amazingly enough, however, this is the second Virgin-Mary image that I know of created from an attempt to eradicate unwanted visitors. ‘Tis true dear reader, the same as the Milford Mary emerged on a window screen after laundry spray took the life of a bug, this Mary in Del Rio emerged on the wall of John and Tina Zapata’s house, after John “sprinkled poison on the back wall of his home to kill some ants,” according to this KVUE report.

South Texas media glommed onto this story a few days ago and hundreds of people(from as far away as Minnesota) have come to see the manifestation, which Tina actually recognized as the Virgin of Guadalupe. Along with the requisite visitors eager to photograph the image and pray in its presence, the “Blessing of the Back Yard” has inspired the Matlachines, a mask and cape wearing group of Matachines. This Del Rio News Herald article reports that the “traditional religious dance group who typically performs during the Christmas holidays,” has come out to celebrate this event.

There seems to be some real potential for metaphors here: a holy figure formed by the desire to quash life. What can this say about the contemporary state of faith? It may mean that people are desperate for a stain of hope, no matter how it came about. It also may mean that people are more than happy to let their faith be bolstered in the company of others. I’d imagine that most of the people whom have paid their respects to this icon would say the latter.

What do you think? Is this hopeless hope? Is this yet another opportunity to be reminded of something greater? Is it the naysayer pessimist in me that questions how displays of faith can come out of taking life? Are, or were, they just ants? Can it be ignored that the Bible examines the value of sacrifice: Abraham and Isaac, God and Christ?

I can answer all of these questions at once, with another question: If so many heady issues can be extracted from this happening, doesn't that make it culturally valid?

Don't Mind the Seeds

Another California tale from an Arizona resident, fresh like this watermelon Virgin of Guadalupe. More abstract even than the Jesus driftwood from my last post, this sighting is all about the shape. No matter what you may, or may not, see, it really doesn’t matter because Mary Lou Robles noticed this holy form as soon as she split open the melon. That’s how Mary’s daughter Crystal sees it, too: “It's unexplainable but sometimes God does miracles and maybe it brought her a visual of the watermelon so she can realize she's a great woman and somebody else is watching over her. . . . As long as she sees it and as long as she knows that it’s a thank you.”

Apparently, the watermelon, reported yesterday by First Coast News, is already more than 10 days old, with no sign of rotting.



Interesting about this also is the fact that Robles works in the Calipatria State Prison snack bar. She was getting ready to cube the watermelon so it could be served. Her co-workers told her to throw it out.

Only in California would inmates get fresh fruit.

Deep in the Heart of Texas

When Irma Vega's husband came home from work the other day, he was bearing a gift. The shape of the Virgin of Guadalupe was noticed by the man after he unearthed this rock at a construction site in San Antonio, Texas. Irma recognized the shape, too. As did the priest who blessed the rock. The Vegas feel lucky, and have created a shrine. In this report from WOAI, their home address is made available, so you can go visit the rock!

Before I started working on Madonna of the Toast, I had written a short story called "Flint Ford." Because I have long been interested in notions of meaning, its origination, dissemination and import, I incorporated the Virgin of Guadalupe into the piece, which is set in Texas. I had been in touch with Drew Burk, editor of Spork, and he ended up publishing the story on the website in two installments. Go here to read the portion about the Virgin. Go here if you want to read the story from the beginning. A slightly edited version of "Flint Ford" will appear in a forthcoming print edition of Spork.