The August sun sets early in northeastern Brazil. The late afternoon rays stretch over clay rooftops and spill into the old Paraguacu River as it winds its way to the Atlantic coast from deep in the heartland of the state of Bahia. Eighty kilometers upstream, the rush of the river's tide brushes along its banks in Cachoeira. It hisses through the grass and travels upward, where, on a hilltop, it echoes in the rustle of starched white dresses. A group of women gathers in the darkness.
More women emerge from a small white hut beside a church, supporting a funeral bier on their shoulders. They move quietly into the evening air, the weight of their burden reflected in slow, measured steps. They descend the hill along cobblestone streets, passing rows of small colonial houses and ornate buildings, some crumbling with neglect. There is an eeriness about the city, a feeling that time has stood still for two centuries, while its weathering effects have not.
The silence is pierced by the women's voices rising in song, "No ceu, no ceu, com Minha Mae estare" (In heaven, in heaven, with my mother I will be.) They reach the grand baroque Church of the Matriz and proceed down the aisle. The priest waits in front as hundreds of followers fill the rows of wooden pews. Holding lighted candles in their hands, the sisters stand before the pulpit while the priest recites a mass for the deceased. The inert figure beside them is an image of the Holy Virgin, but it is not she the sisters mourn tonight. They are paying homage to all sisters past and to the grand totality of female ancestral power embodied in the Iya-mi (my mother) in Yoruba.
Thus begins the celebration for Our Lady of the Good Death (Nossa Senhora da Boa Morte). The death of the Holy Mother and her assumption into heaven have been commemorated by this society of women for nearly two hundred years. Over a two-week period, the Boa Morte sisterhood unfurls its annual feast through the streets of Cachoeira, immersing the small historic mountain city in a sea of masses and processions. Multitudes revel in the popular, colorful display of Christian liturgy. The discerning eye, however, will detect another tradition, one based on West African themes and symbols. The sisters, all older women of African descent, are devout members of the Afro-Brazilian religion, Candomble. The roots of their faith reach to Africa.
The order, officially known as the Irmandade de Nossa Senhora da Boa Morte (Sisterhood of Our Lady of the Good Death), is a resolutely independent society of black women, which neither recognizes the pope nor belongs to any church. The basis of the sisters' faith is not easily knowable, for they are a self-proclaimed secret society whose fundamentals are shrouded in Afro-Catholic mystery. Tracing the saga of their 170-year-old tradition is further hampered by the fact that many of the sisterhood's own records and documents were destroyed in a fire during the 1950s.
Instead, the story of the sisterhood emerges in bits and pieces, rising out of the bitter history of slavery in Brazil and carried forth by the gallant efforts of men and women to retain their dignity and culture. Even today, this struggle continues as the sisterhood in Cachoeira strives to preserve itself and maintain its independence. Theirs is the last vestige of a once ubiquitous
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