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With Cofradía Santa Cruz ensconced in their new home, the telinel eases into his job of serving, imploring and attending on Rilaj Mam. For this is what gods need — they crave attention and adulation, they want to be fed and watered, they love being cosseted. And nowadays that is the best we humans can do for them.

Later we heard that, only three weeks after the festivities described here, personal internal frictions disrupted the Cofradía San Juan. This may well have a profound effect on the way this ritual year develops, but these events still have to play themselves out before they can be reported upon. One way or another, this certainly demonstrates the state of flux and flow within the traditionalist fabric of this Maya city and the effect of clashing personalities within even as traditional a structure as that of a cofradía.