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Religion and Social Change: Classical Theories and New Formulations in the Context of Recent Developments in Latin America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2022

Brian H. Smith S.J.
Brian H. Smith S.J.*
Affiliation:
Yale University and Centro Bellarmino, Santiago
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Theories on the relationship between religion and social change over the past decade have received significant new empirical inputs from developments in Latin America where religious symbols and institutions have undergone some dramatic alterations under the influence of various modernization processes. Sociologists and anthropologists in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Europe stressed the basically conservative effect of religion on society, and concluded that religious institutions are normally obstacles to change as a result of their traditionalistic orientation and association with established social structures. However, there is a growing uneasiness with the conclusions of these major theorists (Spencer, Malinowski, Durkheim, Marx, Weber) in the light of developments in major religions in some areas of the Third World, particularly Roman Catholicism in Latin America. Popular reporting as well as recent scholarly research have noted significant shifts to the left in parts of the Latin American Church, exemplified by strong episcopal condemnations of social injustice, growing political activism of militant clergy groups, and the emergence of new pastoral and social programs aimed at religious and societal reform. The conclusion in much of this literature is that the Church is undergoing a major transformation and this new phenomenon will provide a powerful stimulus for social change throughout the continent.

Type
Research Article
Information
Latin American Research Review , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , Summer 1975 , pp. 3 - 34
Copyright
Copyright © 1975 by Latin American Research Review

Footnotes

*

Prepared for delivery at the Eighth World Congress of the International Sociological Association, University of Toronto, Canada, 19 to 24 August 1974. I wish to thank my good friend, Alfred Stepan, whose sharp criticisms and generous assistance through many drafts made the paper possible. I am also grateful to Juan Linz, Margaret Crahan, David Apter, Thomas Bruneau, Alex Wilde, and William Foltz for their helpful suggestions.

References

Notes

1. Herbert Spencer, The Principles of Sociology, 3 vols. (New York: D. Appleton and Co., 1896), 3:104–6; Bronislaw Malinowski, Magic, Science and Religion (Garden City: Double-day, 1948), pp. 63–69, 87; Emile Durkheim, Elementary Forms of Religious Life (New York: Collier, 1947), p. 257; Karl Marx, “Contribution to the Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right: Introduction,” in Karl Marx: Early Writings, ed. T. B. Bottomore (New York: McGraw Hill, 1963), pp. 43–44; Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion, trans. Ephraim Fischoff (Boston: Beacon Press, 1963), passim.

2. Vittorio Lanternari, The Religions of the Oppressed: A Study of Modern Messianic Cults, trans. Lisa Sergio (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1963).

3. Burma and Tanzania are two of the more striking examples. In Burma in the 1960s, U Nu attempted to construct socialist economic and political structures on the basis of the traditional Buddhist values of egalitarianism and communal sharing (Donald E. Smith, Religion and Politics in Burma [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965], pp. 132–33; Edmund Leach, “Buddhism in the Post-Colonial Order in Burma and Ceylon,” Daedalus [Winter 1973], pp. 29–54). In Tanzania, Julius Nyerere is attempting to construct socialism at the grassroots level, combining traditional African values of ujamaa, or familyhood, with Christian ideals of community. For an extended treatment of Nyerere's goals and strategies as a Christian socialist, see his Ujamaa—Essays on Socialism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968).

4. While it is true that many of these Catholic values have traditionally been associated with corporatist structures—especially in the social encyclicals of Leo XIII (Rerum Novarum, 1891) and Pius XI (Quadragesimo Anno, 1931)—the form and tone of their more recent articulation in the papal documents, such as Mater et Magistra (1961), Pacem in Terris (1963), Populorum Progressio (1967), and Octogesima Adveniens (1971), and in Conciliar and Synod statements such as Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World (1965) and justice in the World (1971), have rendered these principles much less antagonistic to various socialist models of development. For an excellent analysis of the historical evolution of the Church's social teaching over the past century, see Jean-Marie Aubert, Pour une theologie de l'âge industriei (Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf, 1971), 1:81–146. This work also includes extremely useful bibliographical references.

5. For an analysis of the significance of this “opening to the left” begun by John XXIII, and the impact of this phenomenon on Christian-Marxist cooperation throughout the world, see E. E. Y. Hales, Pope John and His Revolution (Garden City: Doubleday, 1965). Paul VI has followed up the work of John XXIII in promoting Christian-Marxist understanding and has publicly recognized that Marxism is no longer a “unitary ideology” but one with “various levels of expression”: “Some Christians are today attracted by socialist currents and their various developments. They try to recognize therein a certain number of aspirations which they carry within themselves in the name of their faith. They feel that they are part of that historical current and wish to play a part within it.” (Apostolic Letter of Pope Paul VI to Cardinal Roy, Octogesima Adveniens, art. 31–32. [Washington, D.C.: United States Catholic Conference, 1971]). While stressing the need for discernment and a certain amount of caution, Pope Paul in no way has condemned these Christians seeking closer collaboration with socialists. The thrust of this letter is conciliatory and free of doctrinaire and polemical overtones.

6. Some examples of this growing interest among social scientists over the past decade in the role of religion in political development are the following: Robert Bellah, ed., Religion and Progress in Modern Asia (New York: Free Press, 1965); Kalman Silvert, ed., Churches and States: The Religious Institution and Modernization (New York: American Universities Field Staff, Inc., 1967); Clifford Geertz, Islam Observed: Religious Development in Morocco and Indonesia (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1968); Donald E. Smith, Religion and Political Development (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1970); Donald E. Smith, ed., Religion, Politics, and Social Change in the Third World: A Sourcebook (New York: Free Press, 1971).

7. Latín American Episcopal Council (CELAM), “Peace,” The Church in the Present-Day Transformation of Latin America in Light of the Council, 2 vols. (Bogotá: General Secretariat of CELAM, 1970), 2:74, 78, 79.

8. Ibid., pp. 78–80.

9. The best collection of texts of episcopal pronouncements on social justice in Latin America has been done by Ronaldo Muñoz, Nueva conciencia de la iglesia en América Latina (Santiago: Talleres Gráficos Corporación, Ltda., 1973).

10. Recent examples of new theological reflection related to the experience of social conflict and injustice in Latin America have been: Gustavo Gutiérrez, Teología de la liberación: Perspectivas (Lima, CEP, 1971); Hugo Assmann, S.J., Opresión-liberación: Desafío a los cristianos (Montevideo, 1971); Juan Luis Segundo, S.J., A Theology for Artisans of a New Humanity, 5 vols. (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1973). The best analytical survey in English to dae of the “theology of liberation” literature has been done by Phillip E. Berryman, “Latin American Liberation Theology,” Theological Studies 34 (September 1973): 357–95.

11. William C. Theisenhusen, Reforma agraria en Chile: Experimento en cuatro fundos de la iglesia (Santiago: Instituto de Economía y Planificación, Universidad de Chile, 1968).

12. Emanuel deKadt, Catholic Radicals in Brazil (London: Oxford University Press, 1970), pp. 122ff.

13. For a summary of recent conflicts and the harassment and imprisonment of Church personnel, see “The Missionary and Social Justice: Latin America,” IDOC—North America (New York) 51 (March 1973): 1–61.

14. This cooperation has been most extensive and dramatic in Brazil and Chile. French missionary chaplains had a significant formative impact on Catholic Action organizations among Brazilian university students in the 1940s and 1950s such as the Catholic University Youth (Juventud Universitária Católica—JUC), introducing them to the existentialist and anticapitalist thought of such European scholars as Emmanuel Mounier, and encouraging the students to become more directly involved in grassroots projects among the Brazilian urban and rural poor. These philosophical and practical experiences opened many of Brazil's Catholic youth to a Marxist analysis of economic problems, and by the early 1960s they formed a radical political organization, Popular Action (Acão Popular—AP), which was independent of Church control and cooperated with Marxist groups in conducting basic literacy training programs and organizing peasant unions in Northeast Brazil (Emanuel deKadt, “JUC and AP: The Rise of Catholic Radicalism in Brazil,” The Church and Social Change in Latin America, ed. Henry A. Landsberger [Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1970], pp. 191–219; Thomas G. Sanders, “Catholicism and Development: The Catholic Left in Brazil,” in Silvert, Churches and States, pp. 81–99).

Chile has had the longest tradition of an institutionalized left in Latin America, with Communist and Socialist parties dating back to the early part of the twentieth century. Chile was also the first Latin American country in which a reform-oriented Christian Democratic party won executive power (1964). After capturing the presidency, significant numbers of the younger Christian Democrats pressed for more comprehensive reforms than the official leadership of the PDC was willing to pursue, and they moved closer to the position of the Marxist left. Consequently, in the late 1960s and early 1970s there occurred several examples of Christian-Marxist rapprochement in Chile, concretized in the following political and religious movements: (1) The Popular Unitary Action Movement (MAPU) appeared in 1969, formed by dissident leftist members of the PDC. The MAPU supported Allende's 1970 presidential candidacy and some of its members served as cabinet ministers during his administration; (2) the Christian Left Movement (MIC) emerged in 1971, founded by a group of mostly young Catholic intellectuals who bolted out of the PDC. The MIC joined the governing Marxist coalition and received representation in the cabinet; (3) Christians for Socialism (Cristianos por el Socialismo) evolved out of informal meetings of about eighty priests in early 1971 seeking to free the Gospel from too close an association with capitalist ideologies and structures. Throughout the Allende years this group grew in number and moral influence, and publicly urged Church leaders to support efforts to construct a socialist process in Chile, while always disclaiming any party affiliation or endorsement. For an account of these movements, see: George Grayson, “Chile's Christian Democratic Party: Power, Factions and Ideology,” Review of Politics 31 (April 1969): 147–71; “El Pensamiento de la Izquierda Cristiana,” Punto Final (Santiago) 137 (1971): 2–4; Secretariado de Cristianos por el Socialismo, Primer encuentro latinoamericano de cristianos por el socialismo: Documento final (Santiago, 1972).

15. By the end of 1965, for example, there were more than four thousand religious from North America alone serving in Latin America, an increase of 50 percent in three years (Noticias Aliadas [Lima], 29/12/65–M). For a detailed breakdown of foreign clerical, religious, and lay personnel working in Latin America in the mid-1960s, see Ivan Labelle and Adriana Estrada, Latin America in Maps, Charts, Tables, vol. 2, Socio-Religious Data (Catholicism) (Cuernavaca: CIF, 1964), pp. 168–69.

16. Comprehensive studies of Church resources and personnel were made in the late 1950s and early 1960s by European and Latin American social scientists and published by the International Federation of Institutes for Socio-Religious and Social Research (FERES), located in Switzerland. The Jesuits also set up a series of research and social action centers throughout Latin America—Centros de Investigación y Acción Social (CIAS)—to study social and religious problems in each country and carry out projects to alleviate them (David E. Mutchler, The Church as a Political Factor in Latin America: With Particular Reference to Colombia and Chile [New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1971], pp. 17, 30).

17. Thomas G. Sanders, Catholic Innovation in a Changing Latin America (Cuernavaca: CIDOC, 1969), pt. 2, pp. 55–79; Walter Repges, “Latin America's Base Communities and Its Parishes,” Diakonia (Vienna), November-December 1972, reprinted in LADOC (Washington, D.C.) 4 (October 1973): 10; Brian H. Smith, S.J., “Pastoral Strategy in the Third World,” America, 18 May 1973, pp. 389–92.

18. Paulo Freire, former minister of education in pre-1964 Brazil and currently a staff member of the World Council of Churches' Office of Education in Geneva, is internationally recognized for his work in developing new concepts of education which stress raising levels of consciousness (conscientization) through grassroots participatory methods. For a description of Freire's approach, see: Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, trans. Myra Bergman Ramos (New York: Herder and Herder, 1970); Sanders, Catholic Innovation, pt. 4, pp. 38–56; Ernani Fiori, “Education and Conscientization,” Conscientization for Liberation, ed. Michael M. Colonnese (Washington, D.C: United States Catholic Conference, 1971), pp. 123–44.

19. Ivan Vallier, Catholicism, Social Control, and Modernization in Latin America (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1970), pp. 71–76, 87–89, 153–54.

20. François Houtart and Emile Pin, The Church and the Latin American Revolution (New York: Sheed and Ward, 1965), pp. 256—57.

21. Luigi Einaudi, Richard Maullin, Alfred Stepan, and Michael Fleet, Latin American Institutional Development: The Changing Catholic Church (Santa Monica: Rand Corporation, 1969), p. 76.

22. Thomas C. Bruneau, “Power and Influence: Analysis of the Church in Latin America and the Case of Brazil,” LARR 8, no. 2 (Summer 1973): 43.

23. deKadt, Catholic Radicals in Brazil, p. 271ff; Sanders, Catholic Innovation, pt. 6, pp. 14–15.

24. Ivan Vallier, “Radical Priests and the Revolution,” Changing Latin America: New Interpretations of Its Politics and Society, ed. Douglas Chalmers (New York: Academy of Political Science, 1972), pp. 24–25.

25. Landsberger, Church and Social Change; William D'Antonio and Frederick Pike, eds., Religion, Revolution, and Reform: New Forces for Change in Latin America (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1964).

26. Frederick C Turner, Catholicism and Political Development in Latin America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1971); Paul E. Sigmund, “Latin American Catholicism's Opening to the Left,” Review of Politics 35 (January 1973): 61–76.

Four recent unpublished studies provide excellent empirical data on the attitudes and behavior of specific groups of priests and bishops in several countries: Michael G. MacCaulay, “Ideological Change and Internal Cleavages in the Peruvian Church: Change, Status Quo and the Priest; The Case of ONIS” (Ph.D. diss., University of Notre Dame, 1972); Michael Dodson, “Religious Innovation and the Politics of Argentina: A Study of the Movement of Priests for the Third World” (Ph.D. diss., Indiana University, 1973); Daniel H. Levine, “Career Patterns and Perspectives of Church Elites in Venezuela and Colombia” (Paper delivered at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, Chicago, August 29–September 2, 1974); Claude Pomerleau, “The Missionary Dimension of the Latin American Church: A Study of French Diocesan Clergy from 1963–1971” (Ph.D. diss., University of Denver, 1975).

27. deKadt's Catholic Radicals in Brazil and Sanders's Catholic Innovation both focus upon specific projects of clerical and lay elites—basic education programs in Northeast Brazil, pastoral renewal efforts in slum areas of Santiago, family planning programs in certain parts of Chile, the development of the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM), and reform movements in Chilean Catholic education and research.

The monograph by Einaudi et al. is an attempt to situate some of the legal and organizational problems involved with reform efforts in an institution as complex and traditional as the Church. However, it presents only a brief overview of four national churches (Colombia, Peru, Chile, and Brazil), as well as a brief summary of some of the inherent difficulties at the structural level facing the Church throughout the continent.

The work by Houtart and Pin, The Church, is a good summary of the existing empirical research up to the mid-1960s on the types of religiosity characterizing different social classes and certain attitudinal patterns of some occupational groups in a few countries. However, much of the information is dated, and the behavioral data so limited in scope that it is not an adequate base from which to assess the patterns of religious behavior throughout the continent, or how they may be changing in recent years in light of Church and societal shifts.

Mutchler's book, The Church as a Political Factor, is a quasi-inside account of the institutional impact of social science research centers on the churches of Colombia and Chile in the 1960s. However, the greater part of the work is based upon materials which Mutchler removed from files and which are not publicly available for scholars to check. His book provides fascinating reading, but his selective paraphrasing of unpublished documents and letters makes it impossible to verify his conclusion, namely that the Latin American Church is an agent of United States and European conservative interests for the purpose of weakening leftist grassroots movements throughout the continent.

There have been two excellent and comprehensive political histories done on national churches with an emphasis on institutional dynamics: Thomas C. Bruneau, The Political Transformation of the Brazilian Catholic Church (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974) and Alexander W. Wilde, “A Traditional Church and Politics: Colombia” (Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 1972). These are very useful contributions but need duplication in other countries in order to amass more systematic data on the structural developments of the Church throughout the continent and to account for variations from one country to another.

28. The one other author who has attempted to come to terms most adequately with the multidimensional aspects involved in the process of change in the Latin American Church was the late Ivan Vallier. He stressed the necessity to take into account the “multiple levels of thought, activity, and organization” in any assessment of the significance of developments within the Church and of their import for society, warning of the danger of making direct causal inferences from formal elements in belief systems to a “religion's obstructive or facilitative roles in social change.” He emphasized rather the importance of studying the growth of new forms of religious control arising out of concrete historical circumstances and feeding back into society with new links and inter-dependencies, thus creating positive or negative contributions towards change and modernization (Catholicism, Social Control and Modernization, pp. 82, 160–62). The great strength of Vallier's work was his elaboration of theoretical models of evolutionary change in patterns of Church influence away from the traditional systems of religious control, and his identification of various typologies of Catholic elites (Ibid., p. 72ff.; “Religious Elites: Differentiations and Developments in Roman Catholicism,” Elites in Latin America, eds. Seymour M. Lipset and Aldo Solari [New York: Oxford University Press, 1967], pp. 204–16).

However, Vallier's ideal types and models need more empirical evidence for verification and amplification, since the dearth of empirical data, survey information, and case studies on the Latin American Church make his conceptual framework rather schematic, too dichotomous, and somewhat lacking in operational power. Furthermore, he did not give sufficient attention to the dynamics of normative developments, nor to the constant interactions between normative dialectics and structural changes. In addition, his stress on the importance of elites tended to create the impression that progressive groups are far more representative of Latin American Catholics than is actually the case. Finally, his conjectures regarding the impact that changes in the Church will have on attitudinal and behavioral trends in society at large need extensive empirical testing, especially in light of the increasing power and prominence of military governments and a more restricted role for the Church since his book was published in 1970. His works, however, are the best overall analysis of the institutional capacities and limitations of the Latin American Church as a transforming agent in society, and provide many fruitful theoretical insights and hypotheses for further research.

29. Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM), “Message to the People of Latin America,” The Church in the Present-Day Transformation of Latin America in Light of the Council, 2:39.

30. “Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World,” The Documents of Vatican II, ed. Walter M. Abbott, S.J. (New York: America Press, 1966), p. 244. For a systematic analysis of the history and reasons for the rather general and unspecific nature of the Church's teaching in many areas of social morality, see Michael Howard Fleet, “Ideological Tendencies Within Chilean Christian Democracy” (Ph.D. diss., University of California at Los Angeles, 1971, chap. 4).

31. Thomas G. Sanders, “Types of Catholic Elites in Latin America, ”Latin American Politics, ed. Robert Tomasek, rev. ed. (Garden City: Doubleday-Anchor, 1970), pp. 186—87.

32. “Declaration de l'épiscopat bolivien, 10 Septembre 1969,” IDOC—International (Rome) 15 (1 January 1970): 65–67.

33. “Declaración de la Conferencia Episcopal Chilena” (Temuco: 22 April 1971); “Evangelio, Política y Socialismos” (Santiago: June 1971). These documents are reprinted in Víspera (Montevideo), May-June 1971, pp. 75–76, 81–87.

34. Gustavo Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation: History, Politics and Salvation, trans. and eds. Sister Caridad Inda and John Eagleson (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1973), p. 65.

35. For a theological analysis of the various ecclesiologies at work within contemporary Catholicism and their structural and behavioral implications, see: Avery Dulles, S.J., Models of the Church (Garden City: Doubleday, 1974); William B. Frazier, M.M., “Guidelines for a Theology of Mission,” Worldmission 18 (Winter 1967–68): 16—24. For a discussion of the literature specifically related to the “distinction of planes” and the “community of liberation” models, with particular reference to the Latin American Catholic experience, see Gutiérrez, A Theology of Liberation, pp, 53–77, 101–19.

36. Sanders, “Types of Catholic Elites in Latin America,” in Tomasek, ed., Latin American Politics.

37. Three pastoral letters by the Chilean hierarchy urging social change which received wide attention both in Chile and throughout Latin America in the 1960s were: Los Obispos de Chile hablan: El Deber social y político en la hora presente (Santiago: Secretariado General del Episcopado de Chile, 1962); La Iglesia y el problema del campesinado chileno (Santiago: Secretariado General del Episcopado de Chile, 1962); Chile, voluntad de ser: La Comunidad nacional y la Iglesia en Chile (Santiago: Comité Permanente de los Obispos de Chile, 1968). For a description of the modernization forces at work in the Chilean Church over the last generation and the progressive influences these have created in Chilean society, see: Henry A. Landsberger, “Time, Persons, Doctrine: The Modernization of the Church in Chile,” in Landsberger, ed., The Church and Social Change, pp. 77–94; Vallier, Catholicism, Social Control, and Modernization, pp. 135–37, 141–46; Sergio Torres, El Quehacer de la Iglesia en Chile (Talca: Fundación Obispo Manuel Larraín, 1971); Cardenal Raúl Silva Henríquez, La misión social del Cristiano: Conflicto de clases o solidaridad cristiana (Santiago: Ediciones Paulinas, 1973).

38. Los Obispos de la Zona Central de Chile, “Solo con amor se es capaz de construir un pais,” (Santiago: June 1973); reprinted in Mensaje (Santiago), July 1973, pp. 335–36.

39. For an account of some of these last minute deliberations and the Church's role in efforts at reconciliation, see: Thomas G. Sanders, “The Process of Partisanship in Chile” (Letter to the Institute of Current World Affairs, New York, October 1973; Latin America [London], 23 November 1973).

40. Bruneau, “Pozer and Influence,” p. 43.

41. General Assembly of the Brazilian National Bishops Conference (CNBB), “A Universal Declaration of Human Rights” (São Paulo: February 1973); reprinted in LADOC 4 (October 1973): 5.

42. Brian Smith, S.J., “Pastoral Strategy,” p. 391.

43. Bruneau, “Power and Influence,” p. 43.

44. For a treatment of the social context and the highly individualistic nature of prophecy in Judaism, see Max Weber, Ancient Judaism (New York: Free Press, 1952), pp. 267–335. Ernst Troeltsch gives a description of the very sectarian character of prophetic religious movements in the Christian tradition (The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches, trans. Olive Wyon, 2 vols. [New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1960], 1:328–445; 2:691–729).

Historical evidence indicates that when the Roman Catholic Church has confronted authoritarian regimes in other eras (e.g., Nazi Germany), although individuals will emerge within the Church to play the prophetic role, Church leaders will attempt to adapt the Church to the existing regime as best they can in order to maintain some structural basis for influence in society and in order to continue pastoral ministries (Guenter Lewy, The Catholic Church and Nazi Germany [New York: McGraw-Hill, 1964], pp. 325–26, 331–32). Furthermore, Church leaders and the faithful as well are often divided in their political judgments under authoritarian regimes, with varying degrees of loyalty to the government. In such situations, consistent opposition to a repressive regime by the hierarchy as a whole is very unlikely, and, even if it were to occur, would deepen already existing divisions in the Church and not achieve a mobilization of Church members against the government. J. S. Conway concludes that the Church itself was infected with the German Zeitgeist of national renewal and hope that brought the Nazis to power in 1933, and that “neither the hierarchy nor the laity had the courage or the means to mobilize the Church against the embattered might of Nazism, and thereby jeopardize the very existence of their own institutions” (The Nazi Persecution of the Churches, 1933–1945 [London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1968], p. 331).

45. “Latin Americans Search for Justice” (Address delivered at the Tenth Annual Meeting of the Catholic Inter-American Cooperation Program [CICOP], Dallas, Texas, February 1973); reprinted in LADOC 3 (April 1973): 29.

46. Remarks by Ralph Delia Cava, Department of History, Queens College, New York, at “Roundtable Discussion on the Church in Latin America” (Yale University, Council on Latin American Studies, 6 October 1973). See also Agostino Bono, “Five Years After Medellin: Social Action Fades in Latin America,” National Catholic Reporter, 9 November 1973, pp. 1, 6, 11.

47. Delia Cava has this data in unpublished form.

48. deKadt, Catholic Radicals in Brazil pp. 137–38.

49. Bruneau, Brazilian Catholic Church, p. 129; Between Honesty and Hope (Maryknoll: Maryknoll Publications, 1970), p. 125; Turner, Catholicism and Political Development, p. 160.

50. New York Times, 1 October 1973 and 31 October 1973. More recent information is based upon personal interviews by the author with several Chilean priests, both in Chile and in the United States.

51. Sanders, Catholic Innovation, pt. 2, p. 68.

52. Houtart and Pin, The Church, pp. 78, 129, 220, 224, 225.

53. Vallier, Catholicism, Social Control and Modernization, p. 48; Turner, “Catholicism and Political Development,” pp. 14, 100ff.

54. Both Sanders and Bruneau have stressed the importance of keeping this dimension of the Church in proper focus when any analysis is made of the Church's effectiveness in society. Much of the literature has tended to treat the Church as a wholly secular organization and has often overlooked careful consideration of the Church's efforts in fulfilling its primary mission—preaching the gospel and meeting the spiritual needs of the whole population (Thomas G. Sanders, “Religion and Modernization: Some Reflections” [Letter to the Institute of Current World Affairs, New York, 4 August 1968]; Bruneau, “Power and Influence,” p. 29). This is not to imply that strictly spiritual ministries cannot have significant social and political consequences, but it does mean that the effectiveness of the Church's religious mission is not synonymous with its success in changing social structures (as Weber long ago emphasized).

55. For example, in the late 1960s the German hierarchy threatened to cut off financial support for a Chilean Jesuit research and training institute, Instituto Latinoamericano de Doctrina y Estudios Sociales (ILADES), which related Church social teachings to problems of underdevelopment and current methods in social science. The German bishops had become very concerned about the leftist tendencies in this project, and demanded the expulsion of all those within the institute expressing sympathies with a Marxist critique of society (Yves Vaillancourt, “La Crisis de ILADES,” Víspera, [April 1971], pp. 18–27).

Another more recent case has been the decision of the United States Catholic Conference of bishops to drop support for the annual conference of the Catholic Inter-American Cooperation Program (CICOP), which brought hundreds of Latin Americans and North Americans together each year to discuss social, economic, and religious problems and design programs of mutual help. Speeches and discussions at CICOP meetings in recent years had become increasingly more critical of United States economic and political influence in Latin America, and they presented a forum in which radical groups could express their views (Gary MacEoin, “Bishops Kill Mutual Aid Program,” National Catholic Reporter, 31 August 1973, pp. 1–2).

56. Berryman, “Latin American Liberation Theology,” p. 395; Gary MacEoin, “Church Renewal on Trial in Ecuador,” America, 4 August 1973, pp. 61–63.

57. Bono, “Five Years After Medellin: Social Action Fades in Latin America,” pp. 1, 11.

58. Vallier, Catholicism, Social Control, and Modernization, p. 104ff; “Radical Priests and the Revolution,” pp. 24–26.

59. Houtart and Pin, The Church, pp. 167–68; Labelle and Estrada, Latin America in Maps, pp. 260–63.

60. Charles Y. Glock and Rodney Stark, Religion and Society in Tension (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1965), pp. 201–6; Gerhard Lenski, The Religious Factor: A Sociological Study of Religion's Impact on Politics and Family Life (Garden City: Doubleday-Anchor, 1963), p. 184ff.; Jeffrey K. Hadden, The Gathering Storm in the Churches (Garden City: Doubleday-Anchor, 1970), p. 110; Joseph H. Fichter, S.J., “Pentecostals: Comfort vs. Awareness,” America, 1 September 1973, pp. 114–16.

61. N. J. Demerath and Phillip Hammond, Religion in Social Context: Tradition and Transition (New York: Random House, 1969), pp. 229–30; Elizabeth K. Nottingham, Religion: A Sociological View (New York: Random House, 1971), p. 176; Glock and Stark, Religion and Society, p. 183.

62. William D'Antonio, “Democracy and Religion in Latin America,” in D'Antonio and Pike, eds., Religion, Revolution, and Reform, pp. 252–53.

63. Phillip E. Berryman, “Popular Catholicism in Latin America,” Cross Currents 21 (Summer 1971): 285–87; Houtart and Pin, The Church, pp. 159–61, 177–81.

64. Segundo Galilea, “Crisis y renovación de la fe,” Misión Abierta (Madrid), September-October 1972, pp. 486—87.

65. Berryman, “Popular Catholicism in Latin America,” pp. 299–301.

66. Landsberger, “Introduction,” in Landsberger, ed., Church and Social Change, pp. 5–6. In the area of education alone, the Church's role is very crucial especially on the secondary level where it operates sixty percent of the schools (Houtart and Pin, The Church, p. 78).