Holidays are about tradition. What happens when everything starts to change?
Carmen Molina Acosta shares a personal perspective on what the celebration of the Novena de Aguinaldos means for her Colombian community and how it has changed over the years.
Some Christmas traditions are pretty standard in mainstream American culture: put up the tree, string up the lights. Hide the Elf on the Shelf, visit grandma, bake the cookies.
Then there's the one my Colombian family does every year: the Novena de Aguinaldos.
A novena is a Catholic practice, where you pray for nine days straight, and this novena counts down the nine days before Christmas. Most Americans have never heard of it, but in Colombia, it's a big deal.
A friar in the 1700s, and as versions were
