When the truck door opens, it reveals stacks of filthy crates. Each crate contains about a dozen chickens packed so tightly that they cannot move. They show the scars of their horrifying journey, missing feathers and presenting open wounds. Absent food and water for days, they hang their heads low in defeat. Every faint breath they take shows their exhaustion and suffering. The look of resignation on their expressive faces could crush the soul of any empathetic person.

These sentient animals experience the same love, fear, joy, and pain as the family dog and cat. They look different but they are no different in their desire to live. The Kaporos victims have endured unthinkable cruelty since birth. They have only known confinement and deprivation and will meet death without ever experiencing anything else. It is unlikely that anyone who attends Kaporos will ever forget it—a mass slaughter of thousands of animals in a public arena that has no place in a civil society.

One by one, the religious cult members yank the terrified chickens from crates, hold them by their fragile wings, and thrust them into the colosseum of their 4th-century tradition. The chickens screech in pain—an unmistakable, chill-inducing whaling. They receive no mercy from the worshippers who believe that to atone for their sins, they must abuse and sacrifice a defenseless animal. They slice off the chickens’ heads but in many cases, they die a slow and gruesome death, discarded on the side of the street having been crushed in transport or mishandled upon their arrival at the pop-up slaughterhouse. The street is littered with their remains, some of which still wriggle in anguish. People walk through their blood without thought, part of this ceremony of felony animal cruelty masquerading as a religious tradition. The religious freedom clause of the constitution, written at the same time that it was legal to tar and feather tax collectors and drag them through the streets, protects the ritual.

I asked a woman in her sixties if she would consider a more humane option to atone for her sins. She became irate and scolded me: “Do you have any idea how long I have been doing this?” she asked as she pointed to the ground. “Since I was this big—a little girl. I will never stop.” I felt sad for her that she never learned to think for herself—hypnotized by a religion drenched in hypocrisy. We evolve by realizing that cultural practices in our past no longer align with our values as we learn new information and change accordingly. No such luck with this cult of the ruthless.

Compassionate bystanders beg the religious followers to show the chickens mercy by holding them properly, asking them to donate coins instead and consider surrendering their purchased chickens to a sanctuary. They scoff at the idea, refuse, and show the animals no mercy in violation of their religion’s laws. Creating their own definition of cruelty enables their psychotic practice, ignoring the animals’ unforgettable cries with a callousness that warrants therapy. We managed to rescue three chickens that evening through relentless pleading and trickery—a silver lining from the killing field.

Despite the horror of this event, one image offered a glimmer of hope. As one of the cult leaders held a screaming chicken in the air, a curly-haired little girl in a stroller, probably around three years old, looked on. The cult leader motioned for the girl to join the sacrifice. The little girl, too young to understand the cruel tradition, looked at the bird screeching and suffering and began to cry. Like the chicken, she was visibly shaken. The look of fear and horror in her eyes revealed a degree of empathy that allowed her to recognize the immorality of violence against animals. Perhaps one day she will grow up and break her family’s cycle and refuse to participate in the barbarism of using chickens for Kaporos. Perhaps someone will ask her to show mercy and she will reply, “Do you have any idea how long I have been doing this? I will stop today.” As I left, I hung my head in resignation and thought of the fear of the chickens and the little girl. What a world.