Self-Flagellation and Real Crucifixions

Self-Flagellation and Real Crucifixions

Modern Extreme Practices in Christianity

Every Good Friday in the Philippines, a group of devout Catholics line up to get nailed to crosses, literally. This isn’t a metaphor, we’re talking iron nails through the palms, a crown of thorns pressed into the scalp, blood dripping down sunburnt backs that have already been shredded by hours of public self-flagellation. Then, once the performance of pain is over, they’re gently lowered down, stitched up, and sent home to do it all again next year.

This isn’t a fringe cult in some jungle village, this is a well-known, annual ritual that attracts media attention, tourists, and die-hard believers, and it exposes something that modern Christianity, especially in its Western form, loves to ignore: that this religion, at its core, has become more obsessed with suffering and sacrifice than with actually living like Jesus.