{"id":3596,"date":"2016-11-22T13:42:10","date_gmt":"2016-11-22T12:42:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grapevinelifestyle.com\/?p=3596"},"modified":"2024-10-08T09:21:57","modified_gmt":"2024-10-08T07:21:57","slug":"december-8th-the-celebration-of-immaculate-conception","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/2016\/11\/22\/december-8th-the-celebration-of-immaculate-conception\/","title":{"rendered":"December 8th: the celebration of Immaculate Conception"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>You might have noticed: in winter the fiestas in M\u00e1laga&nbsp;are less &#8216;<em>ol\u00e9<\/em>&#8216;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There is the Big Boomer of <strong>New Years&#8217; Eve in Coin<\/strong> coming up,&nbsp;that miniature version of carnival in Rio, but apart from that also the festive character&nbsp;of the Andalusians is hibernating: the events&nbsp;are much more intimate and serious in nature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That does not mean they are less lovely or less unique. As for example this&nbsp;exquisite little&nbsp;jewel: the celebration of&nbsp;<strong>Inmaculada Concepci\u00f3n <\/strong>on December the 8th.<strong>&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"250 ANIVERSARIO INMACULADA CONCEPCI\u00d3N PATRONA DE ESPA\u00d1A - CASTILLEJA DE LA CUESTA\" width=\"920\" height=\"518\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/EleyNTaZWOU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>It is one of these little surprises that we as foreigners in inland M\u00e1laga can bump into, and reduce us to tears, and we don&#8217;t know why. Possibly it&#8217;s the feel of being reconnected to history, to our Christian roots or&nbsp;the evoking of simpler, purer&nbsp;days that gives us this chill down our spine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yes, celebrated possibly as early as the 5th century (in Syria) and in the Spanish Empire&nbsp;non-stop for the past 400 years, <em>very little has changed or has been adapted to momentary fashion to this celebration<\/em> &#8211; of <strong>the conception of the Virgin Mary in the womb of her mother, Saint Anne<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Mary might be the only person in history who does not get birthday wishes, but a celebration of her conception (ergo: no fiesta on September 8th, but 9 months earlier).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to the teaching of the Catholic Church, this stands for the Virgin Mary&#8217;s freedom of original sin by virtue of the foreseen merits of her son Jesus. Mind: the Church does teach&nbsp;that Mary was conceived by normal biological means, but God acted upon her soul at the time of her conception, keeping her &#8216;<em>immaculate<\/em>&#8216;.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On that procession of the night of December 7th, for sure someone&nbsp;might want to&nbsp;start humming&nbsp;&#8220;<em>Happy conception to you, happy conception to you<\/em>&#8221; &#8211;&nbsp;and yet this is the magic of processions in inland M\u00e1laga: in all the sarcasm or irony of our post-modern 21st century, in which snow has become &#8216;traffic misery&#8217; and the sky polluted, there are still&nbsp;moments in which we celebrate&nbsp;<em>purity.<\/em>&nbsp;Just like our forefathers did. It&#8217;s a moment of absence of centuries of luggage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hence&nbsp;why a procession, no matter how small, can trigger such an emotion in us?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"http:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\" target=\"_blank\">www.grapevine-properties.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It is one of these little surprises that we as foreigners in inland M\u00e1laga can bump into, and reduce us to tears, and we don&#8217;t know why. Possibly it&#8217;s the feel of being reconnected to history, to our Christian roots or the evoking of simpler, purer days that gives us this chill down our spine.  &hellip; <\/p>\n<p><span class=\"more-link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/2016\/11\/22\/december-8th-the-celebration-of-immaculate-conception\/\" class=\"readmore\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">December 8th: the celebration of Immaculate Conception<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6703,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[699,607],"tags":[709,710,711],"class_list":["post-3596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fiestas","category-history-culture","tag-immaculate-conception","tag-religious-fiesta-in-malaga","tag-virgin-mary-in-malaga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3596"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7057,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3596\/revisions\/7057"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grapevine-properties.com\/lifestyle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}