“No Hay Que Parar:” Joy & Resistance in Hispanic Heritage Month
“No Hay Que Parar:” Joy & Resistance in Hispanic Heritage Month
Most of us in the Christ community with a penchant for the supernatural lean towards healing, prophecies, and signs as welcome expressions of God’s wonder. Ironically, the first miracle given to the church was much more practical: the power to communicate across language barriers. Pentecost was marked by a moment in which people who normally could not understand each other were suddenly brought into fellowship, a turning point in the timeline of YHWH worshipers wherein the message of the Gospel was officially cemented into a globalist context.
We enter into this season in view of the Pentecost miracle, joyfully embracing our family from another tongue. In the face of anti-immigrant hostility, reckless governance and mass deportation, Hispanic Heritage Month is here, and with it the golden opportunity to be transformed by the renewing of our story. Distinctive in its representation of Spanish-speaking groups among the Latin diaspora, this month recognizes the history and contributions of our cousins across the seas who survived the horrors of European colonization and built communities that made America better than it could ever be on its own.
HHM is a time to lean into a celebration of Hispanic cultures, but it is also a time where we soberly reckon with the darker truths of history. As we honor Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Hondurans, Dominicans, Panamanians, Uraguayans and others, we do so in light of their legacies as descennts of indigenous nations whose land and people suffered great atrocities. These are the children of the Mayans, the Incans, the Taino, the Garifuna, the Charrúa, the Guarani, the Cueva, and many more. While racist ignorance demands assimilation under Anglo-centric speech, humility reminds us that the majority of Spanish speakers were passed down their language as a means of survival, the result of colonizers and damnable theology that stripped away heritage to raze their homelands for gold, sugar and precious resources.
Resistance to xenophobia is a non-negotiable for those who claim to follow the Way. To echo the call of Jesus towards the “sheep who are not of this fold” is to engage with God’s image in all persons, from all places - not as arrogant proselytizers, but as family with ears to learn.
May we gladly lift up voices in this time who guide us to hear what the voice of God sounds like when God isn't speaking English. May we mourn with the countless families whose patriarchs and matriarchs have been stolen away by masked men for sounding like the places they came from. May we be filled with courage to dance freely in spite of oppressive policies. May our streets be filled with the sounds and movements of bomba, bachata, mariachis, tejano, and reggaeton. It may be dark outside, but we still have hope. This is not the time to give up and hide. Now is the time to rejoice, for our God is with us. Though we have not seen it, we bear witness in our souls that justice will come. To quote Common Hymnal:
“Baila!
Llego el tiempo para gozar
Lo voy a recibir,
déjalo fluir
No hay que parar!”
Happy Hispanic Heritage Month!
Phillip Joubert
