December is a magical month, where the emotions of happiness, gratitude and nostalgia are mixed
Fernando Pineda Ortiz/Westchester Hispanic
Collaborator
The arrival of the baby Jesus, Papa Noel or Santa Claus, no matter what his name is, is synonymous with the arrival of hope and any small or large gift manages to bring us a lot of joy.
In the United States, Christmas is one of the main holidays of the year. For Americans, the season begins on the fourth Thursday of November with the celebration of Thanksgiving and ends on January 6. During this time, the luminous decorations can be seen in the streets and avenues, while lights and Christmas decorations are installed on the facades of the houses.
While it is true that the Christmas tree becomes an essential element in decorating homes, the nativity scene is more important, as stated by the Reverend Robert J. Morris, pastor of St. Bernard Church in White Plains, who affirms that mangers should be in our homes. “In this period of Advent, invite your children and loved ones to build the nativity scene as a family, pray the novenas together and thus evoke the moments lived by Joseph and Mary prior to the birth of Jesus.”
The novenas of the Child God
Colombians, Peruvians, Ecuadorians and other Latino communities residing in Westchester, no matter how long they have emigrated from their countries of origin, have not left behind their tradition and to the extent that they are allowed to build their manger and Christmas tree and next to Their children pray the novenas that begin on December 16, and they also decorate the gardens and corridors of the houses with a variety of lights that brighten up the cold Christmas nights.
The Latino inhabitants of Westchester agree that memory tells them that the manger has always been more important than the Christmas tree. “The importance is because around the manger we prayed the novena in preparation for Christmas, it is part of our traditions. The manger helps to transport or imagine what the journey to Bethlehem was like for Mary and Joseph and at the same time imagine where Jesus was born,” Jorge Quintero, a Colombian who arrived in this country nearly 30 years ago, told this media outlet.
Posted on December 08, 2022
