PENITENTE MORADA

1940s
Southeast Colorado
National + State Register Nomination
(Completed in conjunction with additional architectural historians and archaeologists)

La Fraternidad Piasoda de Nuestro Padre Jesus Nazareno (the Pius Brotherhood of Our Father Jesus of Nazereth), also known as the Penitentes, is a lay religious sect of the Catholic Church. Focused primarily in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado, but with chapters identified as far west as California, the Penitentes still exist and function as an organization within the Catholic Church. The moradas served as meeting places and as bases for rituals and ceremonies. The Penitente Morada consists of a single building ruin constructed in a regional Hispanic vernacular style, including masonry and adobe construction, thick walls, corner fireplaces (fogon), single square windows, and the remains of a flat roof constructed with vigas and latillas. The morada has a cruciform, or cross-shaped, plan and rounded apse, and is in a state of severe deterioration. 

As the religious center for the Penitentes in the Purgatoire River region’s Hispanic community, the Penitente Morada was the site of ceremonies steeped in traditions dating back to the 19th century. The Penitente Morada is significant at the local level under Criterion A in the area of Ethnic Heritage: Hispanic from c. 1940s-1950s.  The morada is an outstanding example of traditional New Mexican Hispanic vernacular architecture, and as such is also significant at the local level under Criterion C in the area of Architecture, c. 1940s.  Further, via possible subsurface archaeological remains, the morada has the potential to yield information important to the region’s history and should be considered significant at the local level under Criterion D in the area of Archaeology: Historic Non-Aboriginal.