A religious festival brought to Hawaii by Portuguese immigrants will be sponsored this weekend by the Kewalo Holy Ghost Society. Annual Portuguese festival
has parade, Mass and foodStar-Bulletin staff
Members of the organization will parade in Kakaako tomorrow carrying banners and statues of Jesus and several saints. The Holy Ghost Festa also will feature social activities and food service open to the public from 6 to 10 p.m. today and after the parade tomorrow.
Society President Ernest Silva, 84, will lead the procession beginning at 9 a.m. tomorrow at Mother Waldron Park on Cooke Street. Marchers will pause for a 9:30 a.m. Mass to be celebrated by the Rev. Gary Secor at the society hall at 815 Queen St.
The parade will resume at 10:10 a.m., moving along Cooke Street, Kapiolani Boulevard, Ward Avenue and Queen Street, returning to the hall.
Festa King Chad Reis, 16, will wear a crown that is a 100-year-old replica of the one worn by Queen Elizabeth of Portugal, who started the tradition in the 14th century. The queen vowed to donate her crown to Holy Ghost Church in Lisbon if God granted her prayer for an end to a drought. She sponsored a free feast for the poor every year in thanksgiving after her prayers were answered.
The festival and the name of this and other Holy Ghost societies are a uniquely Portuguese observance of Pentecost, when Christians mark the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles as told in the New Testament Acts of the Apostles.
Food on sale tomorrow will include a Portuguese delicacy, vinha d'alhos - roast marinated beef - and jams, jellies and pickled onions.
Click for online
calendars and events.
