Cofradía de San Juan Evangelista

Foundation year: 1880
Anderos: 85. Nazarenos: 111.
Children: 63. Collaborators: 30.

Towards the last quarter of the last century, Mrs. Adela Marín Blázquez y Marín Barnuevo, daughter of the Mayorazgo de Ascoy, was the first Waitress of the Image, which already existed in the years of the regency of María Cristina and possibly dates from 1880, although the Brotherhood was not instituted as such until 1891. Since its inception the white tunic, with red vertical bands before, without them now, has always been its hallmark.

History

The spirit of the Brotherhood has run parallel to that of its orchestra, which could well have been organized in 1892 under the direction of the unforgettable Maestro D. Antonio León Piñera, as seems to be deduced from some press releases that appeared in the weekly magazine "El Enredo" at the time. with dates of April 17 and 24, 1892; In the first one, the columnist, M. Dulce, in addition to highlighting the contribution to the brilliance of the parades of the aforementioned Orchestra, allows himself to advise the Brotherhood that for the future, and in imitation of others, buy tunics, pay cards and thus increase the number of Brothers. In the second, the writer praises the "new Orchestra that under the direction of Maestro León Piñera enlivened the Holy Thursday and Good Friday Processions in the Brotherhood of S. Juan Evangelista", also referring to the "gallant behavior that with said orchestra have had the Major Brothers of said Brotherhood, Mr. José Peña y Marín and Mr. Juan Pérez López, who presented said Orchestra with a soft drink at the house of D. Ignacio Amoraga". Precisely one of its first solo violinists was Mr. José Marín Blázquez and Marín Barnuevo, brother of Mrs. Adela, previously mentioned, and among others were its first members Miguel Ruis Peña, Gerónimo Salmerón Gómez, José Marín Fernández and José Gálvez.

It is evident that the orchestra was created to interpret the two marches that Maestro León composed for San Juan and that his pasodoble San Juan soon became famous, as evidenced by the numerous anecdotes collected about it. Early on the children and the town in general began to hum the well-known verses "San Juan, San Juan is going to fall \ San Rafael is going to catch him". This refrain is only due to the fact that the Image of San Juan was venerated in the Hermitage of the Santísimo Cristo del Consuelo in front of the Image of San Rafael that, due to the position of his arms, seemed to expect that San Juan would fall into them. Later Don Juan Pérez Templado would collect these verses to write the complete lyrics of the pasodoble.

Around 1915 the orchestra lived its golden age directed by Don José Gálvez who played up to forty violins as one. After a few years of hesitation and when Don Antonio Pérez was mayor, D. Manuel Pérez Pérez, a notable violinist disciple of D. José Gálvez, was in charge of forming a complete orchestra. Precisely after his death, the disappearances and reappearances of it were constant. Its last splendor was experienced from 1975 under the baton of Maestro Germán Galindo, with whom, among others, D. Francisco Lucas Navarro, former mayor of Cieza, played. After the death of both, given the advanced age of some of its components and despite the fact that it was considerably renewed, the San Juan orchestra stopped parading in 1989.

As far as the San Juan Pass is concerned, provisionally and between Holy Week of 1890 and 1891, Mrs. Ana Pérez Martínez, mother of D. Federico de Arce and closely linked to the lords of the Mayorazgo de Ascoy, took charge of the Image. . D. Juan Pérez López takes over, who will remain in the Presidency of the Brotherhood until his death in 1919. From 1893 it is an article signed by E.B. in which it was said, in the description of the General Procession, then Holy Thursday, “in sixth place marched San Juan preceded by a large gathering of white Nazarenes. This Paso sported different bouquets of nuanced artificial flowers, made in Paris by order of the daughters of D. Juan Pérez López, to whose exquisite taste the arrangement of the Paso is entrusted".

Mr. Juan Pérez is succeeded by his son, Mr. Julián Pérez Cano, the waitress being his wife at that time, Mrs. Visitación Templado Martínez. D. Julián Pérez and his brother D. Antonio commissioned the neo-Gothic altarpiece of San Juan for the Hermitage of the Santísimo Cristo del Consuelo, where the Image was always kept. It was traditional to see it go down in the popular "Traída de los Santos" along with the other Images that had their place there to participate in the Processional Parades. San Juan was getting ready in a garage that was at the back of said hermitage next to the chaplain's house; the tunics were distributed at D. Julián's house, on the road to Murcia, and from there they left for the Transfer; Arriving at the Camino de Madrid, next to the "Pilar de los burros" the Brotherhood went ahead to take it on a litter while the orchestra awaited the arrival of the Paso.

When the "Bring of the Saints" from the hermitage of the Santísimo Cristo del Consuelo stopped being carried out in 1957, the Image with its altarpiece was installed in the Basilica of Our Lady of the Assumption. However, the Brotherhood still maintains its popular Transfer of Holy Wednesday that is verified from different points of the town and to which the Children's Third of the same is added with its own Step.

As it happened with so many others, the barbarism of the Civil War destroyed the old Image of San Juan sculpted by Sánchez Araciel. It was burned in the hermitage on August 28, 1936, saving only the head that was collected and delivered to D. Julián Pérez Cano who kept it in his house throughout the war. The Image was reconstructed in 1940 by the sculptor José Planes, who carved the body, and by the sculptor Manuel Juan Carrillo Marco from Ciez, who did the same with the hands and feet. El Paso, however, offered some differences with the primitive: this one represented a San Juan in which the body did not keep the proportions with the head; he likewise held a palm in his right hand while pointing forward with his left. The current one, one size smaller, picks up the tunic with his right hand while pretending to hold the palm, which always wears a garland of small flowers following the tradition started by Mrs. Visitación Templado. Maestro Carrillo himself took over the cleaning and restoration of the Image in 1987, which was restored in 2009 by the Valencian restoration company Gaia, under the supervision of the General Directorate of Fine Arts of the Autonomous Community of the Region of Murcia.

We know about the throne that it was gilded, according to a note attached to its interior, in 1894 by Miguel Amoraga, and it is known that it passed through the workshop of the master cabinetmaker José Izquierdo, a Catalan artist who by the last years of the last century had established in Cieza. It was definitively remodeled between 1956 and 1957 by Manuel Juan Carrillo Marco, who completed it with various carvings, renewed the grove of lights and added some vases and four silver eagles. Later, in the Lorente Brothers Workshops, the upper base was restored and a new one was made in the lower part in order to increase the number of rods from three to four. Finally, in 2010 it was once again restored and gilded in the workshop of the tronista Bonifacio Pérez Ballesteros from Ciez, under the presidency of Mr. Antonio Lucas García, who succeeded his father, Mr. Antonio Lucas Lajara in 2004.

After the end of the Civil War and with the reinstatement of the processions, San Juan returned to parade through the streets of Cieza, dressing up for some years in the chapel of San Pascual in the Convent of San Joaquín and San Pascual. D. Julián and D. Antonio Pérez Cano processed the legalization of the Brotherhood, which was refounded in 1948, after having introduced into the Brotherhood in Holy Week of 1944 the electric light staffs, staffs that were replaced in 1997 by others of new design made by the ciezano goldsmith Francisco Penalva, and luxury tunics.

In 1962 Mr. Julián Pérez Cano, first Commissioner of Honor of the Board of Passion Brotherhoods and Honorary President of the Brotherhood of San Juan, died and Mr. Juan María Buitrago Iniesta replaced him, who commissioned an embroidered banner for Holy Week 1971 in gold on both sides with great luxury of precious stones to the cartagena Dña. Consuelo Escámez. He is also responsible for the acquisition of a new Step for the Arrest Procession: Ecce Homo, sculpted by Juan González Moreno in 1972, which has been on display for worship since 1989 in the Church of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción and which had been parading on a throne, acquired in Murcia, made of wood and gilded in the Lorente Brothers Workshops in 1970, until 2004, the year in which the Brotherhood inaugurates a new throne, with a Sevillian air, made and finished in wood, the work of Albatera artist Domingo García Chauán, to which were added in 2006 silver cartouches made in the Ciezano workshop of Francisco Penalva. The Image was restored in 2009 by the Valencian restoration company Gaia, under the supervision of the General Directorate of Fine Arts of the Autonomous Community of the Region of Murcia. That same year was the last year that the Paso paraded in the Arrest Procession, since by virtue of the procession restructuring agreement adopted in 2004 by the Junta de Hermandades Pasionarias it is located in the General Procession, in which it parades already in 2011, which motivates the Holder of the Brotherhood to stop participating in it.

After the death of Mr. Juan María Buitrago, the Brotherhood was directed successively by Mr. Agustín Gómez Pastor and Mr. Antonio Lucas Lajara. Under the presidency of the latter, in 1984 the goldsmith Francisco Penalva was commissioned two lanterns for the Tercio de Nazarenes, Bienvenida Semitiel embroiders a new set of finery for the thrones of the Brotherhood and in 1993 the Brotherhood inaugurated the Paso "El Lavatorio of Pilato” –which has paraded since 2011 under the name of the Judgment- with Images made of wood and canvassed by the Jumillano sculptor Mariano Spiteri (he himself will reform his polychrome in 2001) and a throne carved in wood and gilded by Manuel Lorente Sánchez that same year. For some years the Brotherhood opted to participate in the Processional Parade on Good Friday morning with the new Paso in addition to the Main Paso, until in 2006 it decided that the latter stopped doing so in that Procession. In this way, the Paso San Juan, which had been participating in the General Procession, the Penitent Procession, the Holy Burial Procession and the Risen Jesus Procession, finally sees its outings reduced to these last two Processions.

Finally, in 1997 the Brotherhood recovers the traditional "muco" cap for its Tercio de anderos and in 2011, to accompany the Ecce Homo Pass, establishes the executioner's cap for its Tercios de anderos and Nazarenes.

Pasos
Cofradía de San Juan Evangelista
Ecce Homo
Cofradía de San Juan Evangelista
La Sentencia de Jesús
Cofradía de San Juan Evangelista
San Juan
Cofradía de San Juan Evangelista
San Juan Evangelista (Paso infantil)