Tuesday, January 9, 2018

Ancient Tradition?

The Portuguese village of Vale do Salguerio recently celebrated the Epiphany Festival with a procession,wine and giving children cigarettes. Children as young as five are encouraged to light up even though no one recalls what the tradition means. The parents hand out the smokes to their children with a mixture of pride and excitement and claim they don't see any harm in the practice since it is only done for the festival though the children may smoke up to 3 packs during that time. Since the village is in a remote area it has held on to ideas longer than people in urban areas. Personally I can't figure out what encouraging children to smoke has to do with Christ and for that matter did people even smoke in the time of Christ?
A boy smokes a cigarette during the festival
Epiphany festival

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