Afro-Latin worship

Author: Josué Perea

"The practice of using drums and tambourines (panderetas) with a fast rhythm is very common in both Pentecostal and African religious practices." - Rev. Luis Barrios

I have been preaching for a while, almost thirty years to be honest. It is not because I am so wise, no, it was because I started preaching at an early age at the urging of my father. Actually, I never preached in Bogota, Colombia, where I was born, but I remember when I preached for the first time here in the U.S. I was eleven years old when I shared a surely very brief homily with members of a Pentecostal Church in the Bronx. I don't remember much about it, I remember wearing a suit, I remember being nervous, I remember some kids making fun of me before and during my preaching. But what always stands out to me, what I remember most, well other than the other kids laughing at me, was the music in that church. The way the drummer made the congregation come alive, the way the pianist played, the way the music really added an aspect that my sermon could not provide, I thought it was impeccable.

As I continued to learn and preach in the Pentecostal Church, the musicians and singers continued to impress me. The ways in which their songs invoked God and got the congregation moving, the ways in which people needed an outlet, simply prompted me to think of music in the church not just as a secondary act, but in our Pentecostal churches it was the primary responsibility of the service.

As I began to learn more about theology, music and Afro-Latin, I began to realize that what makes our Pentecostal music unique and so incarnational is its black roots, its African roots. However, as I shared this information with fellow ministers, friends and pastors, the response was always "no, that's worldly, ours is of God." But I wasn't talking about the lyrics, I was just talking about the rhythms that had their roots in African and Afro-Caribbean musicality. Sadly, what this revealed to me was that because of the Anti-Blackness that has been part of our congregations, our culture and our tradition, we don't want to acknowledge that the choritos we sing have roots in Afro-descendant music, in Black culture.

Music that comes from Latin America or is made by Latinos/as is so influenced by African rhythms that denying this should be considered illogical. From merengue to cumbia to tango, all of our music, and even the names of the genres, are African based. The music we colloquially know as Salsa is composed of many rhythms that we know come from African and Afro-Cuban roots. Most of our music has so much Africanness that its sound could not be more influenced by the African Diaspora.

These same rhythms were present in the worship ensembles I heard at all the services and campaigns at my church in Brooklyn and in many churches I visited. Whether the church was predominantly Puerto Rican, Dominican, Colombian or Central American, many of the rhythms of the coritos had many influences that I learned were derived from the African continent. And not only our music, but our whole worship experience, the embodiment of the music is what creates space for the Holy Spirit to take over our minds, bodies and even tongues, is something that resembles other African spiritualities. This is not something we should avoid, but something we should see that connects us to a long tradition of how God operates in people of African descent. It is part of how Pentecost makes use of language and culture.

Samuel Cruz says in Africanisms in disguise: Puerto Rican Pentecostalism: "Asking for God's presence through dance, combined with the sounds of instruments, particularly drums, became an essential aspect of Pentecostal worship. Some have observed that when the drums are missing, they are replaced by shouts, tapping, tambourines, organs... also a very African attribute".

The thing is that we don't like to emphasize that our rhythms have African roots because of stereotypes. Black culture in the Americas has been vilified as demonic or of the devil. Today our music has lost some of its uniqueness, we have exchanged our beautiful original music for generic music that does not come from our origins and simply continues this process of erasing the black. We no longer listen to coritos with powerful theological messages like my favorite Puerto Rican corito:

       Praise God when things go well for you, what a good thing it is!
Praise God when there are no problems in life, what a good thing it is!
But I praise Him out of my brokenness
And Jesus Christ glorifies Himself within me."

We need to begin to reclaim and recognize that our worship, Latino worship, Pentecostal worship and many worship styles used by all of our Latino churches have roots in black culture. It will go a long way in stopping the fight against blackness in our churches and our culture and will make us appreciate our heritage much more. It will make our worship more dynamic, more vivid and, at the end of the day, more incarnational.

The Apostle Paul reminds the Christians in Ephesus to "...be filled with the Spirit, meditating on psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and praising God in your hearts" (Ephesians 5:18,19 TFET). (Ephesians 5:18,19 TFET) The way our Latino, Afro-Latino/as brothers and sisters in Christ make music in their hearts, the way we have made music in our hearts for many years has had its roots in blackness, and we should not question that, we should embrace it and celebrate it for it has been infused by the Spirit of God.