HAPPY EASTER FROM MAPUTO

At the crack of dawn on Easter Sunday, I’m on the beach in Maputo, waiting for the magical moment when believers wade into the Indian Ocean for ritual purification with the first sun rays.

This is a sacred day for many Mozambicans. Among the 25m population, 28% are Catholic, 18% Muslim, 16% Zionists, 12% Protestants and 19% profess no religion.

But overlapping abounds, not captured by surveys. African belief in ancestors’ power and traditional healing runs parallel to religious affiliation. A baby has a church christening and granny’s anti-witchcraft herbal baths. Ancestors are evoked after a Christian burial.

Beliefs blend wonderfully at Easter, which is why I wake up at 4am and head down to the beach. It’s still dark.

First I find hundreds of Maziones, the Zion church, in white robes with colourful sashes. This 100-year old indigenous church blends Pentecostal Christian teachings with African traditions. Their ritual is playful: dunking in the warm water, rolling in the sand, massage with green algae, laughter, clapping and prayer.

Just 300 metres away are a dozen curandeiras, women traditional healers, bodies glistening with coconut oil, adorned with beaded talismans. They are herbalists, skilled in medicinal plants and very popular. Three out of four Mozambicans seek traditional healers before biomedical doctors, says the World Health Organisation. As the sun rises, the curandeiras drum, summoning the spirits of the ancestors, pillar of their cosmology.

Midmorning finds me downtown at the white Art Deco Cathedral for the procession led by the Archbishop of Maputo among swirling clouds of incense. Every year a different parish organises the service, outdoing each other in massed choirs and drumming

At noon I check Our Lady of Victories church on Lenin and Mao Tse Tung Avenues. Its choir rocks! Its congregation grooves! It’s first communion day: all eyes are on the girls in fluffy white dresses, flowers in their hair, taking selfies surrounded by proud families.

Everywhere I feel welcome. When basic courtesy is followed – greet, ask permission to take photos and smile – people are relaxed. A contribution of, say, fifty rand, is appreciated but not mandatory. I leave with the addresses of their places of worship: they want me to visit.

In the course of one morning and 10kms I’ve experienced an amazing kaleidoscope of rituals, beliefs, songs, dance and drumming shared in joy and tolerance – Boa Pascoa, Happy Easter from Maputo!

Words by Mercedes Sayagues
Images – Mercedes Savagues, Getty Images