Though a bit goofy and irreverent at times, here’s an entertaining — and yes, moderately educational — video covering some of the key moments in Latin American history, with a particular emphasis on revolutions.
1. El Salvador’s gang truce
Earlier this year, imprisoned leaders of El Salvador’s two main gangs declared a truce, mediated in part by the head chaplain for the military and police. For the story of another person of faith who has been serving among gang members in El Salvador, see this. While the country’s murder rate has dropped dramatically (52%) and the truce has held longer than virtually anyone anticipated, it’s still a volatile situation. The Washington Office on Latin America’s commentary on the truce seems spot on (emphasis mine):
The current truce opens a tremendous opportunity: Salvadoran society, the Salvadoran government, the Salvadoran private sector, and international donors should move quickly to use the pause in violence to help install social service and job programs in some of the poorest and most gang-ridden communities, in a way that responds to the real needs of those communities most affected by violence. The Funes administration must take advantage of this moment to work with Salvadoran society in developing a solid, long-term, comprehensive anti-gang strategy that emphasizes violence prevention, reintegration, and rehabilitation. Quick movement, even of small amounts of money, for outreach centers, job training and placement programs, and other activities could send an important and positive message that might help transform the short-term violence reduction that has accompanied the truce into a long-term lowering of crime and violence rates. You don’t have to trust the truce to see the opportunity it presents.
2. Brazil’s “March for Jesus”
Last Saturday in Sao Paolo, more than a million Christians participated in the city’s annual “March for Jesus.” Brazil has long been traditionally Catholic, but evangelicals and Pentecostals are quickly gaining ground, as the size of this march demonstrates. But not all evangelicals in Brazil think this march is completely a good thing. Some are concerned about the event’s sponsoring church, saying, “The march has turned into the brand name for a patented pseudo-Pentecostalism.”
The hundreds of young people and adults who travel for short-term missions here, [AJS co-director Kurt] Ver Beek said, don’t always understand what they’re walking into. He believes they genuinely want to be “agents of change,” but too often overlook the reasons behind a country’s systemic problems in the first place. “Justice: Theory Meets Practice,” a seminar he’d dreamt of for several years, was designed specifically to address the larger questions behind such troubles, those that triggered unjust and dangerous situations.
4. Friendship trips
While we’re on the topic of short-term mission trips, the good folks at Alter Video Magazine have a new short film featuring Brazilian pastor Claudio Oliver, who has been on the receiving end of a lot of teams, but proposes a new model he calls “friendship trips,” involving a building project of a very different kind. (HT Katie Jo Ramsey)
6. Introducing Deidox
Somewhere recently (through Jake Belder, perhaps?) I stumbled upon Deidox, “a new series of short documentary films exploring the faith of everyday people.” I’m really looking forward to following along.
Repaso is intended as a thought-provoking compilation of news and commentary from the past week related to the intersections of faith, development, justice and peace. As always, I welcome your thoughts on any of the links and ideas in this roundup!
[Photo credit: "Mara Salvatrucha gang leaders participate in a press conference at the end of a visit by Jose Miguel Insulza, OAS Secretary General, at La Esperanza prison, in San Salvador, on July 12, 2012. (Jose Cabezas/AFP/GettyImages)" via theepochtimes.com]
I just finished reading Oscar Romero: Reflections on His Life and Writings (Orbis) by Marie Dennis, Renny Golden, and Scott Wright, a short biography about someone too few in North America really know.
Romero was the archbishop of San Salvador from 1977 to 1980, and was killed in a hospital chapel during mass just before breaking the bread and sharing the wine. He was assassinated for opposing unspeakable government brutality against El Salvador’s poor during the country’s civil war. He never advocated violence, and refused to demonize his opponents; he even proactively forgave his assassins.
In this book, the authors tell the story of how this reserved, quiet, respectful man became archbishop, how his words and actions became bolder along the way, and how he lives on in the hearts of the Salvadoran people.
He has become a bit of a hero among Catholics across Latin America, but I think he has much to teach all of us, Catholic and Protestant, Latin American or otherwise.
Two or three times over the years I’ve read through a collection of his sayings and prayers called The Violence of Love (available as a free ebook here). One passage in particular has really stood out to me, and I think its applicability for largely comfortable and consumeristic church-goers (which is all too many of us, all too often, if we’re honest) will be clear:
God wants to save us in a people. He does not want to save us in isolation. And so today’s church more than ever is accentuating the idea of being a people.
The church therefore experiences conflicts, because it does not want a mass, it wants a people. A mass is a heap of persons, the drowsier the better, the more compliant the better.
The church rejects communism’s slander that it is the opium of the people. It has no intention of being the people’s opium. Those that create drowsy masses are others.
The church wants to rouse men and women to the true meaning of being a people. What is a people? A people is a community of persons where all cooperate for the common good. (January 15, 1978)
Of course, there is a definite individual aspect to salvation, and before we can be reconciled to each other we must first be reconciled to God. But it seems to me that many of us who are highly concerned with beingsaved seldom consider what we’re saved into and what we’re saved for. I’m grateful for clues to these questions in Oscar Romero’s life and words.
A brief online biography of Oscar Romero is available here.
[About the photo: A tribute to Oscar Romero at Eliana's, a Salvadoran restaurant in our neighborhood in Phoenix where Katie and I had lunch yesterday]
There are a handful of podcasts I listen to, though one of my very favorites isn’t even a podcast per se. Rather, NPR allows you to subscribe to Latin America news stories — three to five minutes each, more or less — and then listen to them without interruption. Because I don’t listen to them every day or even every week, they tend to add up, so sometimes while cleaning up the kitchen or doing something else around the apartment I’ll just listen to a string of them. Last year in Pennsylvania, when Katie and I lived 45 minutes apart, I’d often listen to these snippets on the drive back and forth between Reading and Lancaster.
And invariably I’d wonder what the life of an NPR Latin America correspondent must be like.
First off, Hadden’s a great writer, so even if you’re not up on all the ins and outs of Latin American politics, economics and social issues, it’s lively and fast-paced and reads like a novel. Except, of course, unlike a novel it’s true. Well, most of it is anyway.
The “love” and “ghosts” in the subtitle refer to his personal life during that chapter of his life. There’s a love story woven throughout, and the house where Hadden lives — which doubles as NPR’s Mexico City bureau — is also apparently haunted by ghosts. These storylines add personal, humorous and at times downright odd aspects to the book, but that’s part of what keeps it so interesting and enjoyable.
The story begins when Hadden, who had been all set to go off and become a Buddhist monk, received a call from NPR and accepted this dream job. He arrived in Latin America the year before 9/11, and the story of how that fateful September day changed the course of events south of the border is fascinating in its own right, as it’s a story that has too seldom been told.
From covering Haiti’s tumultuous presidential elections, to interviewing some of the few coffee farmers who remain in El Salvador, to following others north, into Guatemala, through Mexico and on up across the Rio Grande, we learn that the life of an NPR correspondent is at times precarious, and certainly not nearly as glamorous as one might think while listening to the radio in the kitchen or on the freeway. But for Hadden, for a time at least, it was a dream job. And with this book, we’re given some great stories, as well as some difficult, frustrating, saddening ones. And, of course, we have the ghosts.
By now, many have heard of Father Gregory Boyle, the Jesuit priest who founded Homeboy Industries to create opportunities for gang members in Los Angeles to leave their lives of violence and to start doing something life-giving. I blogged about his excellent book Tattoos on the Heart in September and included it as one of my favorite books of the year last week. The work he has done to transform the lives of so many in LA is truly inspiring.
Unfortunately, LA isn’t the only place where gangs are rampant, and Father Gregory can’t be everywhere at once. The good news is that he apparently has a kindred spirit in San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador. He’s Father Antonio Lopez Tercero, or “Padre Toño”, and his parish happens to be one of the most violent neighborhoods in a terribly violent city. While he hasn’t quite matched Father Gregory in entrepreneurial terms, it seems that his ministry is one of the few things holding that neighborhood together and pointing young men to a better way.
Al Jazeera English’s Witness program featured Father Anthony on this recent episode.
If you’re a praying person, please say a prayer for Father Anthony and those he serves in San Salvador. And pray that many more will follow Jesus, the Prince of Peace, into the hard places as instruments of shalom.
