A New Mexico Funcion

A couple of months ago, A. went down the hill to the ranch our older boys work at sometimes to help them repair an old adobe church there. They've been working on fixing it up for some time now and asked A. to fix the large holes and cracks in the inside walls.

They had also sent the stained glass windows to Santa Fe to be repaired. They fixed the rotting floors, did a lot of cleaning, and finally got it in good enough shape to celebrate Mass there.

This church is in the remains of Spanish settlement that predates the current ranch. There are several buildings still standing there, in this place that is about twelve miles of very rough road from the ranch headquarters. We have been there before, and have always enjoyed our visits there.

The settlement was on the land purchased by the family that still owns that ranch. They are not Catholic, but they do have Catholic family members, and all the Spanish occupants of that remote settlement were Catholic.

And so, when the church was fixed, they held a funcion to celebrate.

We were invited to the funcion, but I had no idea what a funcion is. It sounded like a party, basically, but I wasn't sure if it was like a potluck or what. I tried looking it up online and had no luck figuring it out that way. So I called the owner of the ranch and asked her if we should be bring anything, admitting to her that I didn't know what a funcion was or how it worked.

"Funcion" literally means "function," and has a general meaning in Spanish much like it does in English. This particular funcion, however, was a continuation of a tradition at this church of having Mass on their patron saint's feast day, with a procession to pray for rain. Then followed by lunch.

The patron saint in this case was San Isidro--Saint Isidore, who is the patron saint of farmers and laborers--whose feast day is actually in May. They decided not wait for his actual feast day, however, in favor of just having the funcion when the church was ready for it.

They invited anyone and everyone who wanted to come, putting the details in the church bulletins and on Facebook. There are still some people living who lived in this remote settlement as children, although they are very old. It was mostly their children and grandchildren who came to the funcion, as well as the ranch family. 

And us. 

We showed up early to help set up the tables and everything for the lunch afterwards. We also brought the priest with us, so he wouldn't have to drive the extremely rough 12-mile road himself. The Mass was an important part of the funcion, and A. wanted to make sure the priest made it.

It's beautiful down there.

The church looked lovely.

Those circular windows on the sides of the altar looked like ship's windows. From the outside, the windows made it obvious how thick the walls are.

Confessional.

This is the window over the front door, which had to be sent for repair. A. also repaired the plaster and adobe around it, which had big holes in it.

The younger boys got to serve on the altar, although they said it was kind of nerve-wracking because it was so small they were constantly on guard so as not to knock over the candles. Also, the bench they had to sit on was very tippy and they had to brace their feet to keep it steady when they were sitting.

There were no major incidents at Mass, however, and the statue of San Isidro was successfully carried around the church for the procession without any mishaps, either.

He was up there somewhere. We were kind of at the back.

And then we all went outside to sit under the trees to eat enchiladas and beans and posole and sopapillas while the wind tried to blow our plates away.

It was really fun, and I'm very glad we got to be a part of it.