A dramatic volley of joyful cohetes shatters the predawn calm in most Mexican villages on May 3. The barrage of booming skyrockets sounds just like a full-blown revolution to tourists; the initiated know it as the traditional announcement of the beginning of the Day of the Holy Cross, which is also the feast day of the Mexico’s abañiles (brick masons) and their apprentices and co-workers.
When the economy is good enough to keep the majority of the construction companies working building and remodeling homes, that morning blast evolves into a good-natured macho rivalry between teams of builders, Each crew strives to set off more skyrockets than their competitors in a contest of sorts to determine which group is most successful.
As dawn breaks, the frequency of the exploding cohetes increases, to awaken the workers and call them to the early morning “Las Mañanitas service” in their honor. To ward off the morning chill, pairs of men carry huge caldrons of hot cinnamon tea, towers of Styrofoam cups and an abundant supply of brandy and rompope (eggnog-like liqueur) which they stop and share generously with all they encounter.
Matching the high spirits of the men and their early morning bracing drinks is the rollicking polka-beat music of the local banda (brass band) which accompanies each team of masons as they crisscross the village, stopping to refill cups, wake companions and serenade their patrones (project owners).
At each job site, the crew fastens a cross, brightly decorated with multicolored paper flowers and streamers, onto the uppermost section of the building, continuing the tradition that the Spanish initiated during the building of early Mexican churches in the 1500s.
In those early days of Spanish rule, when the cross was affixed to the top of a new church, the padres and missionaries honored the workers by allowing them the rare opportunity to enjoy indigenous dancing and music — both forbidden except in conjunction with a religious observance.
Five hundred years later blasts of noise and puffs of smoke dot the sky marking the location of the construction sites as joyful and thankful workers release skyrockets. The need to disturb loitering evil spirits is forgotten, but the noisemaking custom continues.
At most jobs, the work ends at noon when the owner of the project and the contractor begin the next phase of the fiesta with an exchange of toasts, saluting the success of the project and the safety and good fortune of the workers. Then the owners hosts a midday meal for the construction team recalling an important pre-Columbian custom of placing food and drink on specially constructed altars to dedicate new buildings and to please the gods.
In addition to the early traditions of church building in the new world, there’s another old story that binds the masons to the Day of the Holy Cross.
According to legend, about 1700 years ago, St. Helen, the mother of Emperor Constantine, was credited with finding pieces of the actual cross on which Jesus was crucified. Helen, who is also known as Elena, was in the Holy Lands supervising the building of the first basilicas at the sites of the birth and death of Jesus.
Helen, obsessed with finding the cross, pulled the masons from their work so often that she delayed the construction of those early churches. It is said that on May 3, 332 A.D., while leveling the top of Calvary, the workers found pieces of wood and a plaque, which read “King of the Jews.”
Only Mexico celebrated the cross on May 3. Pope John XXIII removed “The Day of the Discovery of the Holy Cross” from the liturgical calendar in 1960, hoping to focus world attention on September 14 feast, the “Day of Exaltation of the Holy Cross.”
While the rest of the world easily made the switch, the change proved nearly impossible in Mexico where two of the country’s most macho groups had been upset by Rome. September 14, attached as it is to the country’s Independence Day celebration, is the feast day of the charros, those macho horsemen. They weren’t much in the mood to share their day with anyone, let alone the abañiles.
Meanwhile, May 3 had been the feast day of the Mexican masons since the arrival of the Spanish, while they didn’t remember their connection to Santa Elena, the construction workers’ unions weren’t about to relinquish their day or share billing with the charros.
It was a classic Mexican standoff serious enough to cause the church in Mexico to petition Rome to allow Mexico to keep May 3 as the Day of the Holy Cross. Rome wisely agreed to allow the popular celebration to continue, but only in Mexico.