Hispanic

Marleny Almendarez, 38, with her niece Madelyne Hernandez, 3, and two boys, Aaron Hall, 11, and Matthew Hall, 14, outside their home in Dallas on Feb. 18, 2021. The family spent two nights at a mobile warming station to avoid the cold temperatures. Photo: Ben Torres for The Texas Tribune

Neighborhoods across the state — some lined with million dollar homes, others by more modest dwellings — went cold and dark for days as Texas struggled to keep the power on during a dangerous winter storm. But while the catastrophe wrought by unprecedented weather was shared by millions left shivering in their own homes, the suffering was not equally spread.

Mitchell Atencio 12-16-2020

A girl and her father on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Ryan Rodrick Beiler / Shutterstock.com

As the sun sets on each Election Day, people turn to exit polls to understand what happened and why.  After the 2020 presidential election, exit polls suggested that outgoing President Donald Trump performed better among Hispanic/Latinx voters, earning reactions from pundits and former presidents alike. Some have suggested this is due to splits among Hispanic Catholics and Hispanic Protestants, but polls alone may not tell the full story.

Aaron E. Sanchez 11-21-2018

Steve Shreve / Unsplash

The first cast in the ochre light of the dawning sun is a morning prayer, filled with hope and faith that ceremonies sought in earnest will feed the soul. I reel dutifully, waiting for a faint tap on the end of my line. My father stands at the front of the boat, scanning for ripples on the water in the low light. “Wachale!” he exclaims in joking Spanglish as he reels in the first largemouth of the day. Two Mexican-Americans bass fishing in Texas. This is the face of the Reconquista.

Debby Hudson/Unsplash

As a poet, I used to compartmentalize my poetry. Christian poetry, poetry of the body, and Spanglish poetry all had their unique boxes until I came across the term theopoetics in academic scholarship. We all know how language and scholarship work. While white men are busy naming theopoetics to utilize in scholarship, women, women of color, black women, and indigenous peoples have been theopoeticizing since before Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz to the time of Macuilxochitzin.

Aaron E. Sanchez 10-04-2018

And nearly every Sunday, as broken bread stands for broken bodies, I am struck with the words of James Baldwin, when he wrote that to be born black or a person of color in America means that you must “give up all hope of communion.”

When Baldwin wrote those words he believed that the nation was both a Christian nation and a white nation. White supremacy was the foundation of American rites and rights. Whiteness was a prerequisite to be encircled by compassion and included in citizenship. The denial of communion — the denial of the body of Christ and the rejection from the body politic — was connected to the nation’s original sin.

Some years ago, I was supervising a focus group of nonreligious Latinxs. The topic of the focus group was politics and religion. As the discussion progressed, someone meekly mentioned that they were not religious, apparently expecting the judgment of their fellow group members. But they were not judged. One by one, fellow group members surprised each other as they admitted that they were also not religious. They were unaware that there were others like them. Their experiences have been ignored by their ethnic communities and society at large because they do not fit the stereotype of the pious Latinx. Nevertheless, it’s important for religious people and the broader public to understand this particular group.
 

Santi Rodriguez 9-27-2018

Photo by Radu Marcusu on Unsplash

To better comprehend the rhythm of my faith, I need to dig in and do the work. Therefore, I took to Twitter to inquire about the best books on Latinx theology. What follows is a curated list of suggestions I received. These are books by diverse authors from various traditions. It is a beautiful mix. An assortment of theology that tastes like tacos, sancocho, and sugarcane.

Amy Fallas 9-21-2018

I constantly ask myself if I’m betraying my family by responding to the rituals and traditions they so earnestly sought to escape. But then I think about their conversion stories and how they made these decisions to become closer to Jesus.

Image via RNS/Adelle M. Banks

The Rev. Leah Daughtry stood in front of fellow black Christian leaders and told them they will need to work harder for social justice.

“If you’ve been feeding them, now clothe them,” said the Pentecostal pastor and 2016 CEO of the Democratic National Convention Committee at a conference last week. “If you’ve been clothing them, now console them. If you’ve been at a march, now lead the march. If you’ve been at a rally, now organize the rally.”

Image via Thanate Rooprasert/Shutterstock.com

First came the mayors of New York, Chicago, and Seattle declaring their cities “sanctuaries”, and saying they will protect undocumented immigrants from President-elect Donald Trump’s plan to deport them.

Then thousands of students, professors, alumni, and others at elite universities, including Harvard, Yale, and Brown, signed petitions, asking their schools to protect undocumented students from any executive order.

Now, religious congregations, including churches and synagogues, are declaring themselves “sanctuaries” for immigrants fleeing deportation.

Karen González 10-07-2016

Former Miss Universe Alicia Machado. Image via /Shutterstock.com

I don’t mind being associated with the meaningful work that people like my abuelita do every day, whether it be housekeeping, landscaping, or childcare. What I do mind is being dehumanized by a racist, stereotypical assumption that robs me and other Latinxs of our dignity as image bearers of God.

the Web Editors 6-07-2016

While many Republicans — even those who support Donald Trump as the Republican presidential nominee — are going on the record condemning Trump's recent attack on Judge Gonzalo Curiel, saying the federal judge cannot be impartial in the Trump University civil fraud lawsuits because of his "Mexican heritage." House Speaker Paul Ryan, who just last week announced his support, said Trump's comments were "out of left field," and that he "completely disagree[s] with the thinking behind that."

the Web Editors 2-04-2016

Image via Pew Research Center

The good, the bad, and the ugly of this campaign season has exposed the depth of some of the United States’ racial and ethnic fault lines. But the fault lines themselves are moving. The 2016 electorate will be the most racially and ethnically diverse ever, due largely to U.S.-born Hispanic youth and naturalizations of Asian immigrants.

“2013 Religious Affiliation of Hispanics” graphic courtesy of Pew Research Center

The Pew Research Center’s look at “The Shifting Religious Identity of Latinos in the United States” also examined their beliefs, behavior, and views on social issues. It finds that, beyond the church doors in the lives of the faithful, there are distinct differences between Hispanic evangelicals and Hispanic Catholics:

Catholics are less likely than evangelicals to:

  • Attend services weekly — Catholic, 40 percent; evangelical, 71 percent
  • Pray daily — Catholic, 61 percent; evangelical, 84 percent
  • Take a literal view of the Bible — Catholic, 45 percent; evangelical, 63 percent
  • Think abortion should be illegal in all/most cases — Catholic, 54 percent; evangelical, 70 percent

Fernando Alcantar could be the latest Pew Research report come to life. Photo: Andrew Sutton, courtesy Fernando Alcantar.

A new report on the “Shifting Religious Identity of Latinos” reads very much like a biography of Fernando Alcantar.

Like six in 10 Hispanic Catholics in the U.S., he was born in Mexico, where “you are Catholic as much as you are Mexican. You like jalapenos and worship the Virgin of Guadalupe,” he said.

But once he moved to California after high school, his faith journey diverged — and derailed. Today, Alcantar, 36 calls himself a humanist.

The Pew survey report released Wednesday is subtitled: “Nearly One in Four Latinos are former Catholics.” And Alcantar is one of them.

Zurijeta/Shutterstock

Hispanic children are nearly two times as likely to be hospitalized for asthma as white children Zurijeta/Shutterstock

I was raised bilingual and bicultural in New Mexico, the state with the highest percentage of Latino population, nearly 50 percent. In addition to working as an environmental advocate, I am also a member of the rising Latino generation, the fastest growing young demographic in the country. Fifty thousand Latinos turn 18 every month. To put this in perspective, Pew Research Center estimates that by mid-century, Latinos will comprise nearly 30 percent of the U.S. population.

When I was 18, I had just graduated from high school with several years of soccer at Santa Fe’s 7,000-foot elevation under my belt. I was on my way to college, and would go on to complete a master’s of science in an interdisciplinary environmental sciences program.

What my experiences do not include are those that are far too common among Latino 18-year-olds who are disproportionately affected by carbon pollution. Carbon pollution contributes directly to climate change, in turn endangering Latinos due to the resulting health and environmental repercussions. One expected climate impact in the U.S. is more smog in areas with poor air quality, translating to more asthma attacks for our young people. In fact, the Latino community is one of the hardest hit: Hispanic children are nearly two times as likely to be hospitalized for asthma as white children. Other illnesses related to poor air quality, such as chronic bronchitis, are also prevalent within Latino communities, yet nearly half of all Latinos in the U.S. live in counties that often violate ground-level pollution standards

Photo courtesy La Casa Blanca Twitter feed

President Obama and faith leaders meet to discuss immigration reform. Photo courtesy La Casa Blanca Twitter feed

It was past 10 on a Sunday night in Spokane. The wedding was over and I was sitting in the hallway of the hotel in my pajamas reading my email by iPhone while my grandson slept in our dark room. 

I saw an email from White House sent by a woman named Julie inviting me to meet that Wednesday with President Barack Obama and his senior staff "to discuss the moral urgency of passing immigration reform ...  Please RSVP to me by no later than noon Monday ... "

This was a joke. Why would I get an invitation? I emailed friends in the Evangelical Immigration Table, and by Monday morning they confirmed it was real. How could I say no?

I found out later on Monday as we were flying home from Spokane that this meeting was to be a small gathering with the president, his senior staff and a handful of faith leaders in the Oval Office. I laughed out loud. 

Aaron Schrank 3-01-2013

Schools like St Teresa of Avila are struggling with enrollment. Photo courtesy of RNS.

Martha Rodriguez always thought Catholic school was expensive and out of reach — not a place for her kids. But when the time came to send her daughter to the same public middle school she’d struggled at decades earlier, Rodriguez decided to check out what the church had to offer.

“I was intimidated, I thought everyone there would be rich,” said Rodriguez, the daughter of first-generation Mexican immigrants. “But when I went, I was surprised — and kicking myself for not sending my kids sooner.”

Rodriguez now spends $800 a month to send two of her children to Catholic schools in Los Angeles. Her husband works as a paralegal, and she’s out of work, so tuition cuts into the family budget. But Rodriguez says it’s worth it to give her kids opportunities she never had.

Jack Palmer 11-21-2011

Obama At Church: The Tricky, Exciting, Distracting Business Of Worshipping With A President. OpEd: Should A President Be Intelligent? Archbishop Rowan Williams Backs Revolt Against Coalition's Welfare Cuts. Taking It To The Streets. Are Christians To Blame For White House Shooter Linking Obama, Antichrist? Voices Of The Near Poor. What Occupy Harvard Should Tell Liberal Elite Parents On Thanksgiving. Democrats To Protest Immigration Crackdowns. And Hispanic Churches Fight Alabama Crackdown On Immigration.

the Web Editors 11-03-2011

Occupy Wall Sreet, false idols and a moral economy. Breaking the cycle of poverty. Poorest poor in U.S. hits a new record: 1 in 15 people. As poverty deepens, giving to the poor declines. Arianna Huffington: Shakespeare, the Bible and America's shift into a punitive society. Peaceful Occupy Oakland march followed by late-night clashes.