Various towns and cities in Spain celebrate a local holiday on Monday, for the Christian holiday of Pentecost Monday, or Whit Monday, a celebration of a religious nature marked on a changing Monday each year.
For those who believe, Pentecost Monday depends on the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Easter Sunday, which marks the end of Holy Week, and Pentecost is 50 days after this celebration takes place, which on the calendar this year is Monday, May 20, 2024.
The commemoration of the coming of the Holy Spirit is what is celebrated on Pentecost Monday, and according to the Christian religion, when it rested on the apostles, they underwent an immediate and radical transformation that led them to preach the teachings of Jesus. The day of Pentecost is also familiar with the Jewish religion and is celebrated there in memory of the Law that God gave on Mount Sinai, with the proper name of Shauvot.
Regarding the origin of Pentecost, we must go back to the 1st century and in addition to Whit Monday it is also known as Second Easter, Easter Granada, Easter of Pentecost or Pascuillas. “The festival, which originally lasted only one day, fell on a Sunday; moreover, it was so closely linked to Easter that it appears to be not much more than the termination of the Easter season,” reports the Catholic Encyclopaedia.
In Spain, Whit Monday does not fall within the so-called national holidays, although at the municipal level, in places in Catalonia and in areas of Castilla y León (Zamora) and Castilla-La Mancha (Ciudad Real), it is a non-working day in the 2024 calendar. In fact, across Spain, there are more than 30 locations recognising the day as a holiday.
Furthermore, Pentecost Monday stands out because during the early hours of the morning, it hosts the procession of the Virgen del Rocío in the well-known Village of El Rocío, in the province of Huelva.
Pentecost is not a holiday that is celebrated only in Spain and several international countries, especially in Europe, have a holiday on Whit Monday. Among them are Germany, Andorra, Austria, Belgium, France, Hungary, Netherlands, Norway, Switzerland and Romania, while on the international stage, in Argentina, among others, this festival is also given relevance in some parts of its territory.
