A Multitude of Gods and Goddesses

Religion played a prominent role in the life of the Maya. They worshiped a multitude of deities, 160 of them being mentioned in one document. To name just a few, there was a creator god, a corn god, a rain god, and a sun-god. Women made pilgrimages to the temple of the goddess Ixchel on the island of Cozumel to pray for fertility or, if they were already pregnant, to plead for a successful birth.

To the Maya, each day had religious importance, and each month on the Maya calendar had its own festival. Special ceremonies were also held in connection with the burial of the dead. After being painted red, corpses along with some of their personal belongings were wrapped in straw mats. Then they were buried under the floor of the house in which they had lived. It was somewhat different for the rulers, for they were laid to rest in the pyramids, underneath the temples. Their servants were killed and then buried with them, along with various utensils that the Maya believed would be useful in the next life.

As part of their religious observance, the Maya sometimes pierced the earlobes or the lower extremities. They even pierced the tongue. Scenes depicted in sculpture and murals and on pottery clearly show that sacrifice was also a part of Maya worship. “They frequently practiced it upon a variety of animals,” writes Dr. Max Shein in his book The Precolumbian Child, “but the supreme sacrifice was that of human life. The victims of these rites were enemy soldiers and slaves, but also free-born children of both sexes.” Some historians have said that young girls were once offered as brides to the rain god by being thrown alive into a sacred pool at Chichén Itzá. If a girl survived until sundown, this was interpreted to mean that the rain god was content with the bride that had previously been offered. Hence, the girl would be pulled out of the water.

The predominant religion of the modern-day Maya is nominally Catholic, and the church has made great efforts to win the favor of the native population. For example, an Associated Press report states that “in 1992—the 500th anniversary of the Spanish conquest of Guatemala—the Guatemalan Catholic Church issued a public apology for abuses committed against the Indians during its evangelization of Guatemala.”

But the acceptance of Catholicism does not mean that the Maya have abandoned the religion of their ancestors. On the contrary, many Catholic priests accept the blending of church practices and teachings with native rituals. For example, the Maya have long subscribed to animism, the belief that objects—whether animate or inanimate—contain a life force. This concept has been accepted by the church, though veiled in a cloak of Catholicism, causing some church leaders to wonder how much paganism the church can tolerate and yet still call itself Christian.a