Urban Mission in Mexico City: A Changing Context
by Mariano Avila0n January 1, 1994, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between the United States, Canada, and Mexico was inaugurated. The same day, a few minutes into the new year in the mountains of Chiapas, Mexico, the Ejercito Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (Zapatista National Liberation Army), an armed revolutionary Indian movement, declared war on the Mexican government.
Both events characterize the beginning of a new era for Mexico. An era full of tensions and contradictions; of cruel fears and renewed hopes; of extreme riches in the hands of very few and appalling misery shared by millions; of heartless greed and human solidarity. Christian churches were caught in the midst of these paradoxes and summoned by the Lord and reality to fulfill their missionary task.
If the missionary task is going to be achieved in a meaningful and effective way (whether by national or foreign missionaries), the political, socio-economic, cultural and religious implications of the new historical context need to be assessed. Meaningful theological reflection, strategic planning, and contextualized holistic missions are impossible without a serious understanding of the new reality. This article aims to be a modest contribution towards that goal.
If we believe that Jesus is Lord and that his kingdom is a present reality, then it is unavoidable for us to seek the justice of his kingdom. That means, among other things, to know, understand, and transform the different realms of this world which affect our lives in many ways: our family economy, our jobs, the disintegration of our communities, alcoholism, prostitution, unemployment, thousands of children "living" in the streets, etc. We cannot avoid the exercise of our fundamental vocation: to be peacemakers and doers of justice.
Mexico's Fast-Changing Reality
Mexico has experienced drastic changes in the present decade and several more are on the way. Constitutional reforms that ten years ago were unthinkable are today a crude reality. Some of those laws were foundational in the formation of modern Mexico; they were sacred and expressed the greatest achievements of our libertary and revolutionary history. Today they are gone. For example, the Reformation of Juarez in the 1860s (which gave freedom of religion and broke the religious monopoly of the Catholic church) and the Mexican Revolution (1910) which established the basis for social justice, are not what they used to be.
Thus the laws which gave the land back to Mexican farmers are being "sold" to foreigners; the labor laws, which were the pride of Mexico and an example to many countries in their defense of workers' rights, are being changed in these days to benefit the big corporations, both foreign and national.
A government that protected its national economic interests has imposed the Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which is putting our country in the hands of foreigners. This is confirmed by recent figures provided by official Mexican sources (the Bank of Mexico) indicating that over 50 percent of the Mexican population lives at the poverty level, and 35 percent of it in extreme poverty. Just in 1992 the consumption of meats decreased by 27 percent. And since NAFTA was initiated, 80 percent of Mexican micro and small businesses have disappeared, as well as 35 percent of the manufacturing industries. This means a serious problem of unemployment for the country, one that is not being solved by foreign industries and corporations. Two private institutions control 67 percent of the national finances.
Politically we live under a dictatorship that has no parallel in the modern western world, except for Cuba. The difference is that ours is older and stronger, and in many ways more oppressive. Recently, one of the main newspapers in England, The Economist, published a long article analyzing Salinas' government as "the perfect dictatorship" (using the words of Mario Vargas Llosa, the Peruvian writer). It has managed to survive in an era when democracy is growing throughout the world.
Last year this situation started to change. For the first time, the people of Mexico City have a mayor elected by the people. Mexican society has learned to organize and fight for its rights. Democracy is being born in Mexico.
Religious competition is very tough, and today many sects, religious groups, and neo-paganism are flourishing in an open bid to win the minds and hearts of Mexicans. This phenomenon has received a boost as a result of the so-called "crisis of ideologies," which has left many intellectuals and thinking people without a cause, a dream, or a reason to live and struggle.
The Cultural Reality: The Americanization of Mexican Society
The American cultural penetration is at least one hundred years old in Mexico. Using, among other things, the powerful mass media, people's habits, ways of thinking, needs, and tastes are shaped to conform to the values and ideology of the northern countries.
Culturally, the Western capitalist style of life pervades almost everything that the common man reads, hears, or watches every day. The "gospel of prosperity," in the religious domain, is a good example of this cultural hegemony.
A Homo Faber and Homo Consumens are patiently and effectively being created in the image and likeness of the model par excellence, the successful American.
Through all these means critical awareness is killed, and a society which ought to be motivated for effort and solidarity is led to escape from reality and to develop the habits and concerns of a leisure and consumption- oriented world. In the final analysis, the capitalist form of production . . . creates in the dependent countries . . . a form of human existence characterized by artificiality, selfishness, the inhuman and dehumanizing pursuit of success measured in terms of prestige and money, and the resignation of responsibility for the world and for one's neighbor. Insofar as this sham culture kills in the people even the awareness of their own condition of dependence and exploitation, it destroys the very core of their humanity: the decision to stand up and become agents of their own history, the will to conceive and realize an authentic historical project.
(Míguez Bonino 1975:31)
As González Casanova puts it, the Latin American "spiritual conquest" represents one of the greatest and best orchestrated achievements of cultural colonization.
The United States achieved a cultural penetration without precedent in the history of lberoamerica. The values of the "North American civilization" were spread and "internalized" beyond simple "slogans." This was a penetration policy aimed to influence the theoretical frames of reference and the values of the elite as well as those of the masses, and to alter and distort their "natural" ways of thinking and wishing . . . Hollywood's ontology became the common sense of the largest part of Latin America's middle classes . . . Since the conquest of America by the Spaniards and Portuguese, there has not been any culture which penetrated so deep into the south of the Rio Bravo as the North America of the great enterprise.
(González Casanova 1979: 28,29,33)
It is easy to demonstrate that this lifestyle is being formed by the media even among Christians. The great economic interests in the world are alive and well, thanks to a society which has adopted an ideology that tells people that to live is to get, to be a consumer. "I consume, therefore I exist."
This ideology is the reason for the irresponsible pollution of the earth, and the wide separation between those who have and those who have not, here and abroad. Greed is at the heart of this evil system created by the modern capitalistic world. This is true among both rich and poor.
Culturally, Mexicans have been conquered by the "values," fantasies, dreams, and visions of Hollywood. The values of a decadent society are being bought eagerly by our uprooted society, which still searches for identity and meaning. How many missionaries formed by such a culture became models of a different Christian lifestyle? I am afraid that even missionaries will not be able to counter such trends. Being in many ways victims of such a culture, they become good promoters of it, especially those whose missionary strategy is to reach the higher classes of Mexico, living as they do, attending their exclusive, elite clubs, schools, and churches.
Middle class values, with their strong impulse towards social ascension, individualism, selfishness and greed, are nourished more than compassion and personal integrity. The consumption and possession of status symbols (a nice suburban home, a new car, microwave, cellular telephone, and Super Nintendo) are sought with more eagerness and devotion than the kingdom of God and its justice. Personal and family economic security and comfort are valued more than the crying needs of millions of Mexicans. Christian churches conformed to this pattern are flourishing today.
This is especially true of Christian churches that are opting for a gospel of prosperity and comfort, a "Christian" version of mass entertainment, where biblical content and the use of our minds are reduced to the minimum and replaced with "praise workshops" where mystical, ecstatic experiences are induced to achieve "fullness."
Norberto Saracco, a Pentecostal pastor and scholar, uses a case study of Buenos Aires to describe the kind of middle and upper class religiosity which is developing in many Latin American cities. He calls it "the new evangelical religiosity."
Saracco points out the following features:
1. Indigenous movements without foreign influence.
2. Strong dictatorial leadership.
3. Wide use of mass media.
4. Gathering places like movies, theaters, clubs.
5. Meeting places open 24 hours a day.
6. Worship program that is prepared as a show; music and entertainment are central.
7. Preaching is simple and aimed to concrete needs of the people.
8. The prevalent theology is that of prosperity and healing.
In relationship with the city culture:
1. The leader acts, dresses, and speaks as a city person.
2. The gospel presented is acceptable to the,city culture. Artists, athletes and people who work at night feel comfortable there.
3. The style is massive and impersonal, similar to that of the Catholic Church.
4. Individuals may easily remain anonymous among the masses, much like going to the movies.
5. The group claims to be a non-denominational church. Many members also attend other congregations.
Differences with other churches:
1. They claim to be Pentecostal but differ significantly from mainline Pentecostal. They do not belong to the so-called "third wave."
2. Ethics are permissive.
3. There is no emphasis on the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
4. The congregation has a totally passive role.
5. The important thing is not "holiness" but "feeling right."
6. Jesus is not the one who demands everything but one who gives everything.
At the end of his article, Saracco poses some key questions:
• What kind of gospel are these churches preaching? What is its relationship to other evangelical traditions?
• Is this the evangelical side of popular Catholic religiosity in Latin America?
• Are these movements fulfilling for the urban middle and upper classes the role that Pentecostal churches played for the poor in Latin America?
Mexican intellectual Pablo Latapí delivered a warning a few years ago in a colloquium in the Autonomous National University of Mexico in Mexico City.
Latapí painted an undesirable future, one of a neoliberal and modern Mexico fifty years from now. A Mexico that adopted the values of the system imposed on us: efficiency, competitiveness, rationality, economic freedom, the market, and profit. A society which believed in the wisdom of the global market and the money that moves it. The new brave and happy world preached today by the prophets of capitalism, both in the market and in Christian churches with the "prosperity gospel."
An imaginary person, living fifty years from now, reflects in a pointed way on the things and values we "gained" and those that we lost.
"We are nostalgic for a past lost in the transition. What did we lose?"
"We lost mercy, compassion towards the blind and the elders. The extended family in which children listened to the incredible stories of grandparents. Those many things which were not efficient.
"We were so eagerly looking to be competitive that we lost our traditional solidarity. The neighborhood solidarity. The solidarity in the midst of poverty.
"Today we are more rational. Our town fiestas are gone . . . the ancient sense of celebrating life has been extinguished . . .when we became so rational, we lost a great piece of our soul. To become rational meant to lose hope.
"Our children were raised and educated in the motivation for gain and profit and the unquenchable lust to get things. Today we are so poor that we have nothing but money.
"We have lost generosity, the great ability to forgive, and that old Christian virtue called love, which they said was the greatest of all.
"The market provided us with an unlimited number of unnecessary goods, but never gave us the more important ones, which cannot be bought or sold. We entered modern civilization, which considers material wealth the supreme value, but we were left without a human project, without ideals . . .
"Is it possible that we gave up, as gold in exchange for shining pieces of glass, the freedom and the risk of being humans in exchange for the possibility of having many brands of soap to choose from?
Mariano Avila, a graduate of the Ph.D. program in hermaneutics from Westminster Seminary, is a minister of the National Presbyterian Church in Mexico.
From Urban Mission, published by Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, September 1998. Used by permission.
Works Cited
Gonzáles Casanova, Pablo. "México ante la Crisis Mundial." México Ante la Crisis, Pablo Gonzáles Casanova and Héctor Aguilar Camín, eds. (México: Siglo Veintiuno editores. 4th ed., 1989) pp. 13-28.
Latapí, Pablo. "Tuvimos Exito," in Mexico y los Cambios de Nuestro Tiempo (México: UNAM, Fondo do Cultura Económica 1992), pp. 244-248.
Levy, Daniel. "A Brief Political History," Mexico: Paradoxes of Stability and Change. Daniel Levy and Gabriel Székely, eds. (Boulder: Westview Press, 1987), pp. 21-47.
Míguez Bonino, José. Doing Theology in a Revolutionary Situation. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1975.
Saracco, Norberto. "La Nueva Religiosidad Evangélica" La Comunidad en que Vivo, Mariano Avila, ed. Miami, FL: FLET, 1992.
Székely, Gabriel. "Economic and Social Policy," Mexico: Paradoxes Of Stability and Change. Daniel Levy and Gabriel Székely, eds. Boulder: Westview Press, 1987.
Unless otherwise noted, all materials on the urbana.org web site are Copyright InterVarsity Christian Fellowship / USA. All rights reserved.
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