Hispanic Devotional Piety: Tracing the Biblical Roots

Hispanic Christian Tradition is a rich blend of Native American, Spanish, and Portugese traditions interacting with ancient biblical elements. Gilbert Romero mines the social sciences, contemporary hermeneutics theory, and biblical studies to examine the biblical roots and the lived experience of four devotional exercises important to Hispanic Catholics of the Southwestern United States. Hispanic Devotional Piety discusses the problem of relating "normative" biblical revelation and ongoing religious experience. Can such "nonbiblical" devotions as Ash Wednesday, home altars, celebration of the quinceanera, and practice of the Penitentes be squared with "scriptural norms"? Is adherence to Hispanic traditions a source of genuine Christian experience or Christo-paganism as some critics have charged? Gilbert Romero is a priest of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, California. He received his PhD from Princeton Theological Seminary, and has done graduate work at Harvard Divinity School and Oxford University. He has also participated in archaeological field excavations in Israel and the West Bank. For many years he has combined pastoral work with biblical study as a disciple and as a teacher. He has written several articles and has lectured and taught at various universities around the country. His last teaching job, before the stroke, was as a visiting professor of Scripture at the Seminario Mayor San Carlos, Trujillo, Peru.