Boze Cialo - Corpus Christi

Today Poles all across the country will be parading through the streets of their villages and neighborhoods where they live in celebration of Boze Cialo day, or Corpus Christi. If your not Catholic then you're likely unfamiliar with this holiday. You can definitely be "enlightened" by visiting that link above.

The main thing that bothers me on such days is the number of people that take part in the activities. While such holidays do not originate from Scripture, it is a just a picture of people giving themselves to the church. If they were giving themselves to Christ their lives would look differently on every other day of the year.

Of all those I took today, this is my favorite. This woman is preparing fresh flowers that she was using to decorate one of the alters that will be visited by people in the processional today heading through our neighborhood.

A bar owner cleaning his windows so that the locale will look presentable for the processional that will pass by there on its way to the church. This is a great illustration of how most of the time religion in Poland is only skin deep.

This is a nearby street where the procession will travel. You can see down the way a bit the altar being setup by a group of older women.

The procession group as it is rounding the corner up the street from our house. I'm not too thrilled with these last pics as the group surprised me and I had to run out of the house in the midst of preparing charcoals for our grill. I made it but wasn't in time to actually get setup to get the pics I'd thought about.

This is a closer shot of some of the people in the group. You'll notice the assistant carrying the loudspeakers on a pole, as well as some brass players that were accompanying the group as they sang various liturgical chants. It was a thoroughly hot afternoon so I'm sure all everyone, especially those in their official "garb" felt the heat.