Thank you for this opportunity to be part of the ministry of the Robert K. Campbell Lectures, as well as the chance to return to one of the places I call home, the Lehigh Valley. I also would like to commend the Lehigh County Conference of Churches and the organizers of this event for their vision, courage and hard work. I think that our topics for today are timely and important for fulfilling our callings from God in Christ.
We are going to try something that is new for me and possibly for you as well. I had been asked to give bilingual lectures. I'll try that, in a way that is reflective of my generation, and a way a communication common in Texas and the communities here in the northeast. This lecture will be one discourse bouncing back and forth between Spanish and English.
Increasingly people are becoming aware of the social and cultural importance of Hispanics or Latinas and Latinos in the United States.
Refer to Power Point Census Maps
Growth of the Hispanic population is confirmed by the U.S. Census Bureau information, the fastest growing so-called ethnic group. Increasingly this presents new challenges and opportunities for the Church of Jesus Christ.
Research from the Barna Group on the religious characteristic of Hispanics in the United States projects that (The Barna Update: 1/3/01, http://www.barna.org):
The title for the first lecture is "Historia: Reflections on the Hispanic/Latino Church." In Spanish the word "historia" can have the sense of "history" but also "story". As we consider for a few moments the historia of the Hispanic/Latino Church, I want to approach it by telling you a little bit about my own historia.
Personal Historia/Historia personal
My sisters and brothers and I do not fit sterotypes of Hispanics, but our is not a unique story, but rather one that is re-told across the United States by other Latinas and Latinos.
For many years now I have described myself as a Puerto Rican Yankee. By this term I seek to indicate the complexity of my being Hispanic in the United States of America. In the early 1950s my parents, along with tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans as U.S. citizens moved from the island to the mainland. I was born and raised in Connecticut, along with five of my seven brothers and sisters. Because of prejudiced dealings with the local school system experienced in Connecticut, my parents decided that we would be an English-dominant household to enhance our chances of success in society.
One result of this decision is the constant rejection by some within the Spanish-dominant Hispanic community that we are not Hispanic enough. My sisters, brothers and I all experienced rejection by the local Latino community. We all experienced prejudice because we were Puerto Ricans. [No one said Hispanic when I was young, this umbrella term had not been coined yet.]
After education in Connecticut I went to college and seminary in Massachusetts. I was born in New England. I grew up there. I went to college near Boston. My roots are in New England. But although a New Englander, I also experienced prejudice and rejection as a Puerto Rican-in the Church and out of the Church. This led to a growing awareness that I would never be fully accepted by many of my fellow New Englanders. At various points in my life I wanted to live my life by saying to those who had marginalized me, "Fine I'll do without you."
However, I realized that I could not sever my roots and survive and that my roots went into several directions. In the 1980s my parent retired to Puerto Rico and I went to visit them as an adult. And my parents showed me where they grew up, where my grandparents were from, saying things like, "That is where we played," or "Over there is wher your grandfather built one of houses," or "This is where we went to school," it was like I was plant. I could feel my roots grow deep into the soil of that island. I came into a new awareness of who I am as a Puerto Rican Latino. I might not fit any stereotype, but I am still Puerto Rican, Hispanic, Latino. My roots are in Puerto Rico, in New England, and in the church. Without a doubt I am a Puerto Rican, but not one from the isla (island), nor a Nuyorican from El Barrio or El Bronx in New York City. Indeed, many times I knew that a stereotype was at work when a well-meaning person upon learning that I was Puerto Rican would say, "Really?! You don't look Puerto Rican." I knew that a stereotype was at work when I was told by another Latino that I looked "too Presbyterian." As a Puerto Rican Yankee I am a New Englander without a doubt, but not one who traces his ancestry back to the England, but to another island.
Let me tell you another part of my historia. While working in financial aid at Lehigh University I attended a conference where the speaker told us about the growing Hispanic population in the United States, and how businesses were taking steps to address this phenomenon and how colleges and universities should do the same. As I listened, I thought someone in the church also should focus on Latinos and Latinas in the U.S. It was from that moment that I received my calling to study the Latino church and Hispanic theology. And I was afraid. I only had the vaguest idea of where to start since I was disconnected from, and still feeling the pain of prior rejections by the Hispanic community. Eventually the sense of calling led to the decision to study the history of Hispanic Christianity.
Another part of my historia happened early in my studies at Temple University in Philadelphia. It was there that I connected with la iglesia latina. It was there I was introduced into the community of Latina and Latino scholars of religion and theology. It was refreshing and encouraging to discover that there were others who blazed the trail for so many of us through their diverse, comprehensive, and innovative scholarship. It was a joy to be welcomed into the informal but real community of Latina and Latino scholars of Hispanic religion who are sources of encouragement, inspiration, and motivation as well as dialogue partners and friends. They are scholars dedicated to the Hispanic community. Through my personal discovery of Hispanic theology I came to a new appreciation of the importance and reality of the community of faith and the Latino/a community in the U.S. It became a way for coming home. It was another way of finding my roots, mi raices.
Historia and Characteristics of the Hispanic Church
My historia raises a number of questions. When we say "Hispanics" or "Latinos, Latinas," who are we talking about? What do we mean by those terms? When we talk about "the Hispanic Church," what do we really mean? Understanding historia is one way to answer these questions.
Personal stories like those I have just shared are part of the experiences of the diverse Hispanic/Latino communities in the United States. The historia of the Hispanic church is personal, communal, historical, contextual, creative. It is about connections with multiple, complex roots and new diverse contexts. In Hispanic churches people are nurtured spiritually and culturally, both as individuals but also as community. In Hispanic churches theology is done not simply as academic exercises, but also a means and expression of survival and meaning at grass roots levels. As we look at the Hispanic Church we can see many historias and great diversity. Contrary to popular impressions, the Hispanic presence in the United States is not a recent phenomenon.(1) We who are called Hispanics are heirs of several different Indigenous cultures (e.g., Taíno, Mayan, Aztec, and Zapotec), of medieval Catholic Spain, of Muslims and Jews, of Africa, of Asia, and of various European backgrounds (with each European nation having its own diverse background). Or no European background!
Consequently, although information from the Census Bureau shows that "Hispanics" are the fastest growing population group in the United States, part of the diversity of historias is that there is no such thing as a "typical" Hispanic.(2) We are "white" with blond hair and blue eyes, we are dark black with curly hair, and we are everything in between. We have Native American features and/or Asian features. We are Catholics, Protestants, evangélicos, devotees of the Orishas (African deities), Jewish, atheists, spiritualists, and followers of Native American religious traditions. Some speak "pure" Spanish, others speak Spanglish, while others still only speak English. Some have recently arrived to this country, other were here centuries before there was a United States of America.
Here in the Northeast, Latinos and Latinas are still primarily a Puerto Rican population, but not exclusively so. For many people when they think of Latinos in New York they think Puerto Ricans. Last summer when I was in New York City I visited St. Patrick's Cathedral and there saw a shrine to Virgin of Guadalupe, who is central to the devotion and identity of the majority of Mexicans and Mexican Americans. There have been Mexican and Cuban communities here in Pennsylvania since the 19th century.
In the Southwest Hispanics are still primarily a Mexican American population, but not exclusively so. My first summer in Dallas, Texas I saw hundreds of people in line with Puerto Rican flags waiting for Ricky Martin to make an appearance at a shopping mall.
There are Guatemalans working as day laborers in the suburbs of New York. One of the largest Salvadoran communities in the world is in Washington D.C. Not far from where I live there is a Salvadoran community and a Changó botanica.
We who are called "Hispanics" are a multi-cultural people, un pueblo de diversidad, the heirs of many traditions, as a new identity and a new reality are built here in the United States. We are simultaneously "outsiders" and "insiders" on all sides. We live in an existential in-between space. Vivimos en la fronteras de culturas.
What does all this have to do with theology? What does it have to do with the Church? How does it relate to Christian unity?
Historia, Theology and Christian Unity
I will say this as clearly as I can: theology always develops in a particular social context. All Christian life, Christian theology, and Christian ministry always appears in specific social and cultural contexts. Therefore we cannot understand the Hispanic church without these historias from Latino contexts. There is no true understanding of the Hispanic church in the United States unless we are willing to hear these historias.
We will be more effective ambassadors of Christ if we embrace this reality, whether we are a pastor, a layperson, or a judicatory official. So what is the Hispanic/Latino Church? The best way to know and understand the Hispanic/Latino Church is through the historia of its people.
As Christians in the God-created, multicultural household of God, we move a step closer to Christian unity when we consciously listen to these historias.
Part of the reality of Hispanic Church is that we really are talking about a variety of cultural groups that hold on to the identities of their multiple roots, adapt to their current contexts, interact with people of other Latin American roots, and thereby create a new culture. As we try to listen to these different historias, we must consider
There are many historias. An important historia in understanding the Hispanic Church is that of Puerto Rican Juan L. Lugo (1890-1984) As the United States acquired its worldwide possessions, Puerto Rican Lugo found himself in Hawaii with other Puerto Rican immigrant laborers. There, in 1913, he was converted to Pentecostal Christianity. Eventually, Lugo returned to the city of Ponce in Puerto Rico, bringing with him a Pentecostal understanding of the gospel in 1916. Lugo's influential ministry led to the establishment of Hispanic congregations in Puerto Rico, California, and the northeastern United States, and indeed in Latin America as well.(3)
Elsewhere in the borderlands between the United States and Mexico, Mexican-born Pentecostal church leader Francisco Olazabal (1886-1937) was preaching the gospel and ministering to Spanish-speaking people. Olazabal was an important Pentecostal evangelist who influenced many through his ministry, not only in the borderlands context of revolutionary Mexico, but also throughout the United States. Both Olazabal and Lugo were key in the establishment of grassroots theologies and institutions among various groups of Hispanics early in the 20th century. They also worked together in New York City, Texas, California, and Puerto Rico. Such cooperation helped foster a broader Latino/a Pentecostal understanding that transcended local regional identities.
Another part of the historia is recognizing Catholic expressions. In one example, Ana María Díaz-Stevens tells the story how in 1939, non-Puerto Rican Redemptorist clergy were given the primary responsibility by the Catholic church of ministering to Puerto Ricans in East Harlem, New York City. Non-Puerto Rican Redemptiorist clergy were directly appointed by the archdiocese of New York. Later in the 1950s, this ministry was expanded to include diocesan priests leading to integrated territorial parishes. Nevertheless, tensions existed between English-speaking congregations and Spanish-speaking Puerto Ricans, rooted in the expectation that Puerto Rican culture and the use of Spanish would soon fade away.(4) However, in the New York City context they did not fade away, partly due to one of the significant expressions of grassroots religious understandings and practices through the adoption and shaping of the Cursillo movement among Puerto Rican Catholics. In a pre-Vatican II context, Cursillo allowed for Spanish-language liturgies, cultivated lay leadership, and combined with a creative practice of Puerto Rican Catholicism.
All these different stories and many more are part of the Hispanic/Latino church.
Historia and Americanization
As we look at the historia for the majority of U.S. Christian history, one part of the story is the pressure that was placed upon Latino/a congregations by church hierarchy to assimilate to the Euroamerican norm. This sad story cut across denominations, including Roman Catholic, Methodist, Baptists, Presbyterian, Lutheran, and Disciples of Christ, just to mention a few. Against this denominational push there were counter-currents of local initiatives to understand and practice Christianity.(5)
In various locations and at different times the various Latina/o communities were active and creative in their own understandings of Christianity in their own times and very distinct (and often difficult) contexts. Although many of these expressions of Christianity were disregarded, ignored, or held in low esteem, even by their own denominations, there are rich theological and pastoral response.
It was partly due to the negative attitudes from the larger denominations toward those who were theoretically part of the same communion or tradition that help create the tension which contributed to the emergence and articulation of distinct Latino/a theologies. If the assessment of Kenneth Davis is valid and can be expanded historically, one can see that a common motif is an ongoing struggle between pervasive unofficial and socially dominant types of Christianity.(6) Against very difficult odds, Hispanics in the United States were able to put into words and cultivate understandings of Christian life and ministry that were sensitive to and addressed their communities.
Ana María Pineda describes historical memory (hacer memoria) among U.S. Hispanic and Latin American peoples as an act of subversive memory. This subversive historical memory counteracts efforts of marginalization, historical fictions, and forgetfulness. A subversive historical memory becomes an affirmation of life, a declaration of self-identity, and maintenance of a communal sacred trust.(7)
We all need the historical memory of the various historias as we live out our calling to be Church. We need these stories. God forgive us if we forget las historias, the historical memories and testimonies.
Concluding Reflection
The history of the Latina/o theological perspectives can be understood as a historia. In Spanish, historia can be translated as "history" or "tale, story." La historia, the story of Hispanics, is the history of many stories from the multitude of Latino/a cultures in the United States.
Who am I? ¿Quién soy yo? ¡Soy Edwin David Aponte! Yo soy un puertorriqueno from Connecticut, a Puerto Rican Yankee. ¿Qué es la iglesia hispana, latina? It's people of multiple identities and various contexts.
And that is an important part of understanding the Hispanic/Latino churches. With a honest understanding of historias, we can begin to move on to be the Body of Christ together.
References
E.D. Aponte, Historia,
Campbell Lecture 1, April 5, 2001