The word "Theology" has different connotations. Technically it means "a study about God." Others would definite it as "a discourse about God." In recent times, it has been thought of as seeking to articulate and understand the faith, or as someone would express it "faith seeking understanding."
Since this writer believes, as was stated by a professor of mine in seminary that "all theology is tentative," I tend to think of theology as faith seeking understanding. In other words, to me, the task of the theological enterprise is to "make sense" out of our faith.
So the questions is, then, how do people called "Hispanic" or "Latino" in the United States go about seeking understanding of the faith? My response to that is that there is no one way of doing theology from a Hispanic perspective. Like every other ethnic/racial group in the U.S.A, Hispanic people resort to a variety of ways of doing theology. I will briefly list three for the purposes of this essay.
1. Liturgy/worship.
Because worship is so important in the lives of Hispanic believers, there are many Hispanics who base their theology on the words found in the liturgy or worship of the Church. Many of our Hispanic sisters and brothers are very passionate regarding worship, because for them, worship enables them to participate in the events recorded in biblical history, and especially those events which speak of God's liberating actions in history. For them, worship puts them in the very presence of God, and that experience, then, becomes the starting point for understanding the Scriptures and the traditions of the Church.
2. Academic Scholarship
In the Latino community, there are those who have sought to articulate and understand theology via attendance at institutions of higher education, i.e. colleges, universities, and seminaries. Like people in other ethnic/racial communities, we have those who prefer to formalize their knowledge through rigorous research, study, and writing. They engage in formal study of the biblical languages, church history, comparative religions, systematic theology, and studies which focus on the practice of the profession of the ministry.
3. Existential Reality
The Hispanic community in the U.S.A. deals with a variety of issues which explain its existence here, and also the issues that have a negative impact on their lives in this country. Among them we can mention the following:
A. Genocide of the indigenous people of Central American South America, and the Caribbean.
B. The Trans-Atlantic slave trade which resulted in people coming to this part of the world to continue the labor which was carried out by the indigenous people of these areas.
C. Colonization and land-grabbing from the original natives of the Americas (Mexico, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, etc.).
D. Immigration- As a result of colonization, land-grabbing, and unjust economic policies imposed on our countries, many people have been forced to come to the U.S.A. to recover a portion of that which was taken from them. I refer the reader to Eduardo Galeano's book "Open Veins of Latin America."
E. Economic and military support given to brutal and dictatorial governments in Latin America by the U.S.A. has also contributed to the migration to this country. Ironically enough, this support is given to governments which deny their citizens the same democratic rights which we enjoy in this country, i.e. freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom of the press, all in the name of "preventing the spread of communism."
F. Being at the bottom rung of the economic ladder. Hispanics have been known to have the lowest paying jobs and along with the African American community, living in the most deplorable housing conditions in the U.S.A. They also suffer from the dysfunction of the so-called "educational" system of the public schools. The reader is referred to Paulo Freire's book "Pedagogy of the Oppressed."
G. Political underrepresentation- While there are some Hispanics who have been elected to political offices, the interests of the Hispanic community are of minor concern to politicians, except at election time when they seek the Hispanic vote.
These points were not intended to be a "laundry list" of the negative ills which affect the Hispanic community in the U.S.A., nor mere whining and moaning, nor a "pity party." The purpose of mentioning these issues was to point out that for many Hispanics in the U.S.A., these negative economic, political, and social conditions, are the starting point for biblical interpretation and theological reflection. In other words, their understanding and view of God is more oriented towards reflecting on how do these conditions help us to understand and more fully experience the grace and presence of God in the midst of communal suffering?
In essence, this type of theology is not one which is done from the comfort of the academic ivory towers, but rather from the experience of suffering. It is a "bottom-up," rather than a "top-down" theology. It is a theology which is not handed down by the "experts," but rather a theology which emerges from the day to day experience of suffering and survival. It is a theology which addresses the question of "how to be faithful to God in the process of getting the cheese off the truck."
Is this way of doing theology as valid as academic and liturgical theology? This writer believes that there is room for all three approaches. However, because true theology begins in encountering God in liberating and salvific acts, academic and liturgical theology are subordinate to theology which emerges from the grass roots. I know that many of us in the West feel uncomfortable with that affirmation, but nevertheless, this writer has the need to be faithful to the historical ways in which God has been revealed to humankind in liberating action. Liberation Theology did not begin, as many would affirm in Latin America through the Catholic Church in the 1960's. Liberation Theology
began when God said to Moses "I have heard the cry of my people, and have come down to deliver them." May the same God who delivered the Hebrews from bondage in oppression in Egypt, deliver the Hispanic community in the U.S.A from the bondage of classism, racism, and sexism.
In the Name of the Creator, and of the Liberator, and of the Sustainer. Amen.
Dr. Juan A. Ayala-Carmona
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