RELIGION WITHOUT REDEMPTION: SOCIAL CONTRADICTIONS AND AWAKENED DREAMS IN LATIN AMERICA BY LUIS MARTINEZ ANDRADE

The purpose of this piece is not so much a review as an appreciation of a thought-provoking work on colonial conquest and the spurring of economic capitalism in Latin America. Andrade's work breaks with convention by not jumping on the usual bandwagon of relaying the dynamics of European colonialism and how the capitalist economic enterprise gained a foothold in Latin America, but rather, on how capitalism is also tied closely with religion. Roman Catholicism, Latin America's dominant religion, paved the path for colonial conquest to rear its head not only as an instrument of dominance and subjugation of the conquered, but as a tool that served the capitalist economic interests of Portugal and Spain.