Unsure of the exact figure but his TV guide is this( gestures with hands) thick.

Come on! He's in the Phillipines! Surely he won't get more than, say, five or ten channels.

The main problem her is not suffering but suffocating. Have you ever seen this little pedestal on the crucifix. It's there so you can support the weight of your body by your feet and therefore prolong your suffering. When they finally decided to let you die they broke your legs by smashing them. This not only increases the pain but you also slowly suffocate. When the romans slit open Jesus' chest to make sure he is dead, water and blood oozed out of the wound. The water is a symptopm of suffocation.

So the ropes are there to prevent you from suffocating by helping you to keep your arms parallel to the beam.

     I knew about the suffocating, but thought (with legs intact) it could take days. If you're putting nails though the hands why would brething diffuculty matter?

     How long do they stay up there?

Days, yeah, perhaps for the tough guys. I don't think anybody has enough stamina and is awake long enough to stand/hang there for days.

I think the wounds in the hands won't kill you.

Palms or wrists???
 

Leonardo Da Vinci discovered that the nails couldn't have gone through the palms. He tried it. The skin and fascia pulls out sliding along the tarsals and the body falls down.

Through trial and error he discovered that they had to have nailed the wrists. Then there is enough structural support to hold the body.

In examining skeletons from the day, this supposedly is true.

I read all of this on the web somewhere, so it must be true...It makes sense though.

I've tried to do a little research to find out why stigmatics have the wounds in the wrong place, but the sources I can find are Catholic ones that don't discuss that facet of the phenomena, and in fact dismiss the psychosomatic angle almost entirely.

<a href="http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_237.html">Straight Dope on crucifixion & stigmata.</a>


<a href="http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=005Kt7">a believer's answer.</a>

My experiences in the Philippines
 

I lived in the Philippines for 12 years growing up and I saw these crucifixions several times. Here's what I've seen/heard from other Filipinos.

First off, the Philippines were a Spanish colony for 400 years and through that time they had Catholicism impressed upon them. Some took to it very well, others rejected it, yet others incorporated it with their own animistic beliefs.

In the case of the crucifixions, many of those who are being "crucified" are trying to show their dedication to God. It's an extreme sense of penance, an idea in Catholicism that I don't truly understand. This crucifixion is similar to the stories of random Saints who would flog themselves because they want to humble themselves more before God. Not my style, but admirable if that is their true desire.

Physically, they have nails throught their hands and then rope around their wrists (or else, as Shivaa pointed out, they would just fall down with rips throught their hands) and a little hump on the cross to stand on. They will usually hang up there for a couple of hours, or perhaps if they're really dedicated, all night, and then they'll come down. I have heard rumors of people who have actually killed themselves doing this whole thing, but I've never seen it or heard it from a credible source.

It seems to me like it's a big production to scare kids, but I don't want to knock it, since I haven't tried it.

Welcome Ipret. thanks for the real poop.