Closed for Corpus Christi, or The Farming Practices of Protestants

Anywhere you live, you can see how the customs, culture and holidays of any land is bathed in their history. This is, of course, true in Germany, and one of the interesting things about being here is observing the remaining residue of the Reformation and the ensuing conflicts in produced. Many towns, including my own, have a large Protestant and a larger Catholic church, for example. Some areas still find a strong religious identity that defines their area, such as the proudly Catholic Bavaria. And of course, the States with enough Catholic citizens and influence have Catholic Holiday off.

So, my new home state of Baden-Wuerttemberg is closed for business today for the feast of Fronleichnam, or Corpus Christi. B-W is traditionally Catholic and Protestant and was historically divided by not just religion, but by tribe, fiefdom, economics and much else until Napoleon conquered the whole area and put it under one administrative unit (which no one bothered to change after Napoleon's defeat). We didn't growing up staying home for such religious holidays in the States, so not being Catholic (or high-church Anglican, for that matter), I couldn't tell you when the feast was or how it came about (but for the full story, you can read all about it on Wikipedia or talk to your Catholic friends).

I've since learned that Germany's Protestants had their own Corpus Christi tradition. Martin Luther called the day un-biblical and "the most damaging of all feasts," as Corpus Christi celebrates the Catholic view of the Holy Eucharist. As a provocation, Protestant farmers in Germany would always plan to fertilize their fields on Corpus Christi, creating a pungent smell for the Catholic processions. Patriotic Protestant that I am, I have neither fields nor fertilizer, and besides, there's not much of a movement to stick it to the Catholics anymore. Practicing Catholics still march in the Corpus Christi processions, while Protestants, and pretty much everyone else, enjoy the day off.