Manuel Castaneda IV portrays Jesus being led to to his death during a Stations of the Cross procession on Good Friday held by Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in Kissimmee. (TOM BURTON, ORLANDO SENTINEL / April 10, 2009)

By Victor Manuel Ramos
Sentinel Staff Writer

A group of men shoved Manuel Castaneda IV, ripped off his clothes and crucified him Friday morning at a sports field in Kissimmee, while the crowd prayed for forgiveness.

It was a re-enactment of the biblical Easter tale at the center of Christian belief.

About 150 people watched as the 20-year-old Castaneda carried the wooden cross, egged on by others dressed as Roman soldiers and comforted by those representing pious women and the Virgin Mary. Parts of the story of Christ's passion were told over loudspeakers in English, Spanish and Tagalog, a language of the Philippines.

The presentation, known as the Stations of the Cross in Catholic tradition, was put together by a youth group to commemorate Good Friday at Holy Redeemer Catholic Church, which has a significant Hispanic and immigrant congregation.

It was as much a time to nurture their faith as to celebrate the church's diversity.

"We are trying to tear down the walls and bring all the cultures together with Christ," said Brandon Rivera, the youth minister at Holy Redeemer who organized the re-enactment, mixing Hispanic, Filipino and American traditions.

This telling of Jesus' path to Golgotha was among the commemorations at dozens of Orlando-area Catholic churches, where immigrants from Latin America and other regions have brought their traditions of worship.

Much of the recent growth of Catholic congregations in the U.S. is attributed to the participation of Hispanics and other immigrants, whose celebrations are becoming part of the church's mainstream traditions.

About a third of all Catholics in the U.S. are Latinos, according to a 2007 survey of race, ethnicity and religion by the Pew Hispanic Center, a research organization in Washington, D.C. The Latino share of the church population is expected to continue climbing for decades, that study found.

Because more Hispanics identify themselves as charismatic, which is closer to spirit-filled and renewal movements, they are helping to move the church toward more expressive worship.

"My experience of the Hispanic tradition is that it's earthy, it's real and tries to get as close to the actual experience of Christ as possible," said the Rev. Chris Hoffmann, pastor of Holy Redeemer. And that influence is already noticeable in Central Florida, where churches in immigrant-rich communities such as Buenaventura Lakes, Apopka, Altamonte Springs, Deltona, south and east Orlando had their own multicultural commemorations of Jesus' story.

Carol Brinati, a spokeswoman with the Catholic Diocese of Orlando, said nearly 40 parishes across Metro Orlando would host Spanish-language, bilingual and multilingual events this weekend — including a Stations of the Cross procession in Haitian Creole and a liturgy in Spanish at St. James Cathedral in downtown Orlando.

Glorimar Dominguez, Kissimmee, took her 2-year-old son, Amaurys Javier, to get a front-row view of the crucifixion.

But she said she was the one most affected by the flesh-and-bones depiction of a man striving to carry a cross, being whipped along the way and finally raised on a cross. "You feel what's happening in the bottom of your heart," said Dominguez, who attended Stations of the Cross processions in Puerto Rico.

Damien Teehan, of St. Cloud, said the tradition has become part of how his nonimmigrant family observes the holiday. "It really makes you feel that this story is not just something that happened over 2,000 years ago," he said, "but that it's something that is relevant today."

Victor Manuel Ramos can be reached at vramos@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-6186.

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