St. Martin's Day

Last night we participated in Kaiserswerth's celebration of St. Martin's Day. This day is commemorated in several countries in Europe, though the Brits in town were as new to it as we Americans. I don't quite get it, but it was interesting to partcipate.

St. Martin was a nobleman who was riding along on his horse one day and saw a poor man without a cloak, so Martin tore his cloak in half and gave it to the man. Later he has a vision of Jesus and Jesus tells him that he was the man in the cloak (all very Matthew 25:40) and St. Martin dedciates the rest of his life to service in the church.

So on St. Martin's Day, kids and their parents gather for a parade. All the kids carry these paper laterns on lighted sticks (someone's making a fortune on these sticks) and walk through town following St. Martin on his horse. It was quite the experience for Maddie to carry her lantern (which she made in school) throughout the streets of Kaiserswerth with a whole mix of German, English and American kids and their parents. It was a long walk for anyone and a REALLY long walk for a five year-old. Naturally, when walking behind a horse, someone (Skip) is bound to step in some manure.

Then after winding through the streets of Old Town Kaiserswerth, you end up with this huge crowd (at least 1000, if not more) of people at a re-enactment of St. Martin giving his cloak to the poor man. Then a narrator on a microphone tells everyone how important it is to share what you have with others.

Now this would have been a great time for everyone to leave some food or clothing or something that could be shared with the poor (it would have to be exported because there aren't poor people in Kaiserswerth), but instead everyone rushes for this building where you can exchange the ticket you bought last week for 2.50E for a bag of goodies. Then you can go around to the various merchants in town who will also give you treats. Like Christmas in the US, there seems to be a disconnect between the message and the celebration.

Maddie hasn't even finished her Halloween candy and now there's a whole new bag of goodies--although I was pleased to see that for St. Martin's Day, apples and oranges are standard as well. And in Germany, nobody thinks twice about eating an apple that someone has handed them--even if you don't know them personally.