Real Violence and Real Religion in Latin America

European religion came to the Americas with the sword and for centuries was directly aligned with domination. The cultural and political hegemony of Catholicism was reinforced by the power of laws and coercive public institutions. The mutual impact of violence and religion was heightened in many countries by the civil wars of the 19th century and then again in the last half of the 20th century as systematic state organized repression on a large scale ran into churches and religious actors redefining their mission and their outreach. The result was heightened public disputes, many deaths, and the emergence of sectors in the churches (and some national churches in particular) as key articulators of human rights and supporters of the human rights movement. The turn of many in the churches to human rights as an issue and a cause was spurred by the experience of encountering victims of violence and in many cases, becoming victims themselves.1 I use the term “real violence” to distinguish direct physical coercion of all kinds from the concept of “institutionalized violence” that became common coin in religious discourse in Latin America following the meeting of the region’s Catholic Bishops at Medellín in 1968. As a concept, institutionalized violence directs attention to the effects, often indirect, of unjust political, social, and economic structures. These include poverty, poor health and vulnerability to disease, precarious employment, limited education, restricted mobility, and abuse at the hands of the rich and powerful. These conditions are maintained by inequalities of power and create conditions that lead to preventable disease, early death, abuse and intimidation of all kinds. These are very real effects but the violence at issue in “real violence”