Public Service with a Prayer

Talk about history. In the city of Zaragoza there is a Catholic brotherhood that came into being back in the thirteenth century. It's the Hermandad de la Sangre de Cristo. (The Brotherhood of the Blood of Christ.) Apart from praying and interceding for those who request it, they have a very special job. Almost from the inception of the brotherhood, these men were charged with attending those about to receive the death penalty and afterward interring their bodies; as well as picking up bodies of those who died a violent or unnatural death. 

Throughout almost eight hundred years, that is what they've done, without being paid. And that's what they still do. The only thing that the city pays the brotherhood is the vans they need, the salaries of a few helpers, supplies, and classes to acquire the knowledge they now need when dealing with a crime scene, and to lessen any biohazard they may encounter. That's quite a tradition. And evolution. They have evolved from selfless men devoted to collecting the remains of strangers dead in strange situations, including the plague and other epidemics, to men who practice their faith in a modern setting with every necessary precaution. From a donkey and a cart to a coroner's van.
 
Of course, it's also cheap for the city. And in these tough times, if an organization has been doing it for so long, why break an excellent symbiosis? Yes, the Catholic Church is still very much in public life, and it's not about to change any time soon.