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| March 1, 2010 | Coimbatore priests offer holy offering through mouth-to-mouth contact | |
Coimbatore:Hundreds of devotees participated in the seven-day-long
Karamadai Sri Ranganathar Temple Masi Magam Car Festival in Coimbatore. The festival
culminated with a temple procession in a village at Karamadai on Sunday, in which
the priests offered prasadam (holy offering) to the devotees through mouth-to-mouth
contact. People in the outskirts of Coimbatore still practice this tradition and
believe in the superstition that if the priest, who is considered as god's messenger,
puts prasadam in their mouth through his mouth then the childless women conceive
soon and all their family problems disappear. During the festivities hundreds
of women devotees received prasadam through this unique ritual by the temple priests.
"This is a seven day festival and on the sixth day we take the deity into the
streets of the village. During the procession we give prasadam to the devotees
who don't have children. When they receive the holy blessings in the form of prasadam,
it is believed that they conceive very soon," said Govindswamy, the temple priest.
It is said that the holy offering or god's blessing is only given to a chosen
few and the devotees in turn worship the priests as demigod. "The holy prasadam
is not given to everyone alike. The beneficiaries are asked to come forward and
take it through which they can attain benefits. More over it is not only that.
If the prasadam is taken it takes away all the difficulties of the family and
brings peace and joy. That is why they pray us as gods," said Palani Swamy, another
priest. The procession is taken out with traditional music, which puts the devotees
in a state of trance, and the prasadam is fed to them. "I did not have a child
even after 10 years of marriage. I had prayed to all gods and at last I received
the holy blessings in the form of prasadam from the priest here and I am very
happy for this," said Mahesh, a women devotee. One of the priests carries the
holy Kaavalam, which is a bundle of cloth rolled in an arc and set on fire. In
another ritual during the procession, the priest throws bananas from his mouth
and the devotees try to capture it with a piece of cloth. It is a common belief
that if the devotees fail to catch the prasadam then they will face serious consequences. |
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