Additional Resources

Las Posadas

Mexican “Posadas”...
A tradition for Christmas

On the evening of December 16th, children of every age process through the neighborhood or parish hall to mark the journey of Mary and Joseph.  It is the beginning of Las Posdas “lodgings,” a celebration rooted in Mexican heritage.  Each Advent, the young and the old, reenact the story of Joseph seeking lodging for his young wife, Mary, who is weary from travel and heavy with child.  For nine nights in a row, children and adults assume the identity of the weary couple or of the innkeepers, processing around the inside of the church or throughout the neighborhood, moving from one designated site to the next.  This is the beloved ritual of Las Posadas, “lodgings,” rooted in Mexican heritage and celebrated throughout Latino communities each Advent.

At each station, an ancient exchange is repeated.  Those playing the role of Joseph approach the inn, knock on the door, and say in a loud a voice, En nombre del cielo, buenos moradores, dad a unos viajeros posada esta noches.  (In the name of Heaven, we ask those who dwell here give to some travelers lodging this season.)  From inside a chorus of voices responds, Aqui no es meson sigan adelante; yo no puedo abrir no sea algun tunante.   (This is not an inn; move on --- I cannot open lest you be a scoundrel.)  As Joseph moves from one inn to the next, the innkeepers grow angry and even threaten violence, while the night grows colder and the young couple’s weariness turns to exhaustion.  Venimos rendidos desde Nazareth, yo soy carpintero de nombre Jose’.  (We are tired traveling from Nazareth; I am a carpenter named Joseph), the anxious husband implores.  Finally, he even reveals his wife’s true identity, begging for posada for just one night for la Reina del Cielo, the Queen of Heaven – to no avail.

For eight days, the scene is reenacted.  Finally, on the ninth day, the eve of Christmas, Joseph’s request moves the heart of an innkeeper, who offers the young couple all that he has left – a stable.  Yet this humble place becomes the birthplace of Jesus.  With an outpouring of joy, the door is opened, and everyone is welcomed into the festivity, to celebrate the generosity of the innkeeper and the posada given to Mary and Joseph.  There is song and dance, traditional food and drink.  Candy and treats from the piñata spill over the children, and the community remembers anew how the stranger at one’s door can be God in disguise.

“Every December, Hispanic [Latino] communities relive in their flesh the Gospel truth that “the Word became flesh and lived among us” (John 1:14).  “He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him.  He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him” (John 1:10-1).  In Las Posadas, they ritually participate in being rejected and being welcomed, in slamming the door on the needy and opening it wide.  They are in this way renewed in the Christian practice of hospitality, the practice of providing a space where the stranger is taken in and known as one who bears gifts”  (“Hospitality,” Ana María Pineda, in Practicing Our Faith, Dorothy Bass, editor). 

Las Posadas and the Gospel Practice of Hospitality

Within the Biblical story, all God’s people are spiritually descended from migrants and wanderers, and are called to live in hospitality.  Abraham and Sarah responded to God’s call to journey far from home in search of the promised land.  Later, after years of slavery, these descendents were a refugee people, wandering in the wilderness.  And later still, they were taken into captivity and sent off to a distant land.  “As a result, their laws always required them to deal justly and compassionately with strangers among them” (Pineda).  “You shall also love the stranger,” God instructs the people through Moses, “for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Deuteronomy 10:19).  “Resident aliens must be judged and protected by the same laws that govern insiders, and strangers must be treated with the same respect one would wish for oneself.  Just as God protected the people of Israel when they were refugees, so God insists on proper care for other aliens now, judging harshly those who treat them ill.  God’s people will be a people whose just hospitality flows from gratitude for God’s past care and from their own painful memories of refugee life” (Pineda).

Matthew’s Gospel begins with the story of undocumented aliens, Joseph and Mary, fleeing with their baby son, seeking posada in Egypt.  The Gospel proclamation becomes a way of living into the practice of hospitality.  It flows through the abundant grace of loaves and fishes into the surprising story of posada, where, as we share hospitality, we discover Christ in the face of the stranger (Matthew 25).  The early church, through the circle of mutual hospitality, grew up “turning hosts into guests and guests into hosts” (Pineda).  “Welcome one another as Christ as welcomed you, for the glory of God” (Romans 15:7).