“The Song of the Irias” was performed in Boston on April 12th in English and again on April 13th in Portuguese of 2019. With an audience totaling over 300 people between both days, the fruits of many prior months of hard work by the entire cast and supporting ensemble could be seen at the end of each night’s performance.
There was a very real and present feeling of happiness and of God’s power to touch and transform people’s lives through the arts and a special moment of prayer after show allowing the Holy Spirit to work in everybody’s hearts. For some people it was a way to prepare to begin Holy Week, for others it was a first experience with God’s love.
The play was written by a member of the Shalom Catholic Community, originally in Portuguese, and has already been presented all over the world with versions in Spanish, Italian, Hungarian and English. The storyline follows our story of “salvation”, from Genesis to the encounter with Jesus, showing how the First Human, an intimate friend of God, destroyed that relationship by letting their sins transform them from a human into an “Iria” – a deformed person.
The story follows the hardships of living a life apart from the Truth and ends with how Jesus was able to restore their dignity, saving all mankind.
Wendy Ramirez, a member of the cast, said:
Even though I had participated in the play to years ago, I can truly say that God touched me in a very deep way this year. Two years ago I had the honor to be the Truth and this year I was able to live a different perspective with the play as an Iria. I was able to see the hard work, dedication and sleepless nights of everyone who made this play possible from the cast to the many people behind the scenes and to see how so many people had a deep experience really touched me and made every sweat drop beyond worth it! Me personally, I was really able to experience God and see how I really needed to be reminded of this: I am no longer an Iria because of His great love and mercy, He created us to be His beloved children, humans not creatures, He created us to have life and so often we ourselves push His grace away, feeling unworthy by being so impatient with ourselves in this process of purification. To have been able to end the night with a beautiful prayer as we invited the audience to be prayed over was very humbling, seeing so many people kneel before the altar really inspired me to become vulnerable to God’s work in my own life. It was a very beautiful way to begin this Holy Week and I look forward to being able to present this play, our story of salvation, in the future so that others may have a deep experience with God’s infinite love and mercy as well.
Check out some photos from the event.
The Shalom Catholic Community in the USA is located at 42 Sciarappa Street, Cambridge, MA.
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