Amaranta Gutierrez

March 3, 2015
The Enemy in the Ballroom
Growing up in a old-fashioned culture, a small town with deep roots in religion and a
family who tried to maintain a pious reputation, made me wonder if it was sheer deviancy of my
personality or the absolute realization, that what had started as a holy religion and pure faith
turned, the generations before me, into blind believers of the church; That everything that
brought extravagant joy was by means sinful. The generation before my mother, my grandmother
or even my great-grandmother, refuged in church for inspiration and hope that their hardship
would someday end. It was taught that in order for god to help, one would devote their entire life
to church. Attendance of church was not enough, donations to the sacred place had to be made,
and prayers had to be done as soon as day peaked, during sunset and before the night ended. God
and the church would be the only thing that could bring true joy and happiness without ever
indulging in temptation or sin, any other event that brought thrilling excitement or elation was
considered debauchery.
At that time I developed a love-hate relationship with their teachings. In the eyes of the
church, this made me the apostate, a child of the devil, infidel of my community. In the eyes of
my older generation I was doomed and heaven would be out of my reach. That worry-some
feeling, I can only assume, is what the parents of the young Mexican American teenage girls felt
during 1930s, but the girls must have felt what I felt; The constant battle of accepting and
rejecting their parents old roots (that had been engraved to them by their church of origin [?*]
and the heartache that the old generation saw the new generation lost in temptation.

It is not hard to see that religion has always been important in the Mexican culture. In fact
one could argue that the religious culture is what gives the essence of being Mexican. It is a
colorful festival and it truly does bring joy, but I cannot help myself to think that the Catholic
Church poisons that which is beautiful. As I was reading I found the passage that spoke about the
hidden temptations of danc[ing] (p. ###). Hidden temptations the church warned the older
generation about. I assume the older generation did not abject to these statement, but only the
new generation suffered their consequences. Deep in me I feel some sort of resentment for the
parents who believed the church that something as harmless as dancing could translate into
something sinful and be that of a devils game.
Not only did the church warn the older generation that something that brought joy to their
children was wrong, also managed to maintain immigrant families segregated and isolated,
ignorant to the new world they migrated to. Never frequent fairs, picnics, carnivals, or public
dancing halls where Heaven only knows what sorts of people congregate (p. ###) It is no
wonder why when one ask a newly immigrant person how they feel in [this] new culture, for the
most part they answer they feel lonely---because it is engraved in us to not allow us to enjoy the
gifts exotic places brings, heaven wont want us if weve indulged and accepted a new
environment.
The Enemy in the Ballroom (p. ###) is perhaps the best example I can find that
expresses my personal dilemma with the church and the anger I feel towards my older
generations for believing the church blindly. [something something]