Christians In The Nicaraguan Revolution

"The controversy within the Catholic Church over the concept of liberation theology raises the questions: is there room in Christian philosophy for a socialist society? And is there a place in a socialist society? Nicaragua's recent experience, says Margaret Randall, shows the answer to these questions to be "yes". The dominant role Christianity played in the Nicaraguan revolution both before and after the 1979 overthrow of the Somoza regime shows that the concrete goals shared by the two ideologies, Christianity and Marxism, outweigh their theoretical contradictions. The main part of Christians in the Nicaraguan Revolution consists of long narratives by members of two Christian base communities with key roles in the Nicaraguan revolution. Solentiname is the retreat founded in the mid-sixties by Father Ernesto Cardenal -- now Nicaragua's minister of culture -- on a remote island in Lake Nicaragua. El Riguero is an urban community, founded in 1972 by father Uriel Molina in a Managua barrio. Christians in the Nicaraguan Revolution features the voices of "ordinary" believers as well as those of well-known religious and political leaders" -- Back cover.

From the John Holmes Library Collection.

Journalist Christian's masterful, evenhanded account of Nicaragua's Sandinistas derives from years of interviews and on-the-scene observations. Beginning with the last days of the Somoza regime, she details the morass of political intrigue through November 1984. The problem is, she argues, that the success of ``sandinismo'' turned the people from instigators of change into objects of change, both in the eyes of the church and of the state. As the center of the struggle flew out of control onto the battlefields of Havana, Washington, Rome, and Panama, democratic principles were subordinated to other peoples' needs, a no-win situation for the peasants. To draw conclusions about Nicaragua, Christian emphasizes, is a lot more difficult than superficial U.S. policy would imply.

This volume addresses the complex issue of the Christian response to the Nicaraguan revolution from a perspective generally sympathetic to the Sandinista's goals. Luis Serra, himself a Latin American who has worked with the peasantry, argues that the institutional Church has now become a major autonomous source of opposition to the revolution. Laura O'Shaughnessy, analyzing the years leading up to the 1979 revolution and through the Papal visit of 1983, argues that the Church heirarchy has mistrusted the revolution as a threat to its traditional authority. Both authors view the involvement of the progressive clergy in the revolution as the best way to keep the revolution "Christian," both as an institution and as "the people of God," in revolutionary times, and they ask if Church-state conflict is inevitable at the outset of a social revolution or if adaptation and accommodation are possible.

In this moving volume edited by celebrated Spanish journalist Teófilo Cabestrero, fifteen...men and women explore their twofold identity as Christians and revolutionaries, describing their integration of faith and political conviction within the Sandinista revolution. Despite the diversity of their experiences, the persons interviewed here--judges, doctors, poets, professors, organizers--reveal a shared commitment: to improve the quality of life for the poor in Nicaragua, a commitment rooted in the liberating message of the Gospel. (back cover).

The 1979 rebellion in Nicaragua was the first in modern Latin America to be carried out with the active participation and support of Christians. Like all revolutions, the Nicaraguan Revolution has provoked controversy and hostility, and the Christian presence has been a focal point in the debate. In this work Michael Dodson and Laura Nuzzi O'Shaughnessy offer a detailed study of the religious sources of the revolution set against the backgound of the revolutionary traditions of the United States. Nicaragua's Other Revolution places the experience of the Nicaraguan Revolution in a historical framework that extends back to the Protestant Reformation and in an institutional framework that encompasses the whole of Nicaraguan politics. Examining the broad process of religious change, this work explores how that process interacted with the political struggles that culminated in the revolution. Dodson and O'Shaughnessy conclude that the religious values and attitudes arising out of postconciliar renewal in the church contributed powerfully to demands for revolutionary change in Nicaragua. In England and America the Protestant Reformation gave a tremendous boost to demands for democratic changes in society and politics. This work shows that something similar happened in Catholic Central America in the post-Medellin period. Changes in religious thought and action were part of, and served to reinforce and stimulate, a wider movement for social and political change. Without denying the importance of Marxism, the authors demonstrate that other important influences are at work there. Originally published in 1990. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.