HBJ came across this little treasure entitled The Church in the Barrio: Mexican American Ethno-Catholicism in Houston (University of North Carolina Press). Scholar Roberto Trevino restricts his study to Hispanic mainstay state Texas, but his observations and his readings of Mexican Catholics might have been about the Dominican community in Nueva Yo or Cubans in Miami's Little Havana---so on point are they. Trevino, whose most recent work is a collaboration with Richard Francaviglia (Catholicism in the American West, Texas A&M University Press), is a history professor and the co-head of the Center for Mexican American Studies at the University of Texas. The Church in the Barrio isn't one of those books with the intriguing title, and little substance, but rather an in-depth, cross-generational, cross-historical little gem, well-cemented with stunning illustrations and notes that capture Catholicism in all its santa glory.
