Nacimientos

Nacimientos - nativity scenes are very much part of the popular piety here in Honduras. Often they are elaborate with loads of people, animals, buildings, and more. Some people make them in the front room of their houses or in a corner of their stores for all to see. And of course, there are nacimientos in churches, as this one in the church of Dulce Nombre de Maria.

The center of the nacimiento is what they call "El Misterio" - the images of Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and the ox. But imagination often runs wild, as in this nacimiento set up last year in the Church of San Marcos, Gracias, Lempira, which even has a miniature of the church among the figures.


There are others that are more traditional - like these two from the Santa Rosa campus of the Catholic University of Honduras.



These examples of the popular piety of the people here remind us of the mystery of this season - a God who became human as a poor child in the midst of the hub-bub of life. We have a God who is not looking on from afar but one who participated in the nitty-gritty of our lives, especially the lives of the poor.