Blancarte: Catholicism on the Dust Heap of History

Famed analyst of religion in Mexico, Roberto Blancarte, has declared that Catholicism is destined for abandonment in Mexico ("el catolicismo esta destinado a ser abandonado"). His pessimism comes from the latest numbers from INEGI that shows the number of Catholics in Mexico dropping after yet another census, now claiming about 84% of the population - a drop of roughly 4 to 5% in the last decade. Says Blancarte, "as long as the church continues with its boring liturgy, as long as its representatives fail to respond to the needs of the people and maintain their criticism of contraceptives or the condom, or as long as sex education is bad, the people are going to grow farther and farther away." (mientras la Iglesia continúe con sus liturgias aburridas, mientras sus representantes no respondan a las necesidades de la gente, y mantengan sus críticas hacia el uso de anticonceptivos o del condón, o que la educación sexual es mala, la gente se va a alejar más y más).

I respectfully disagree with two aspects of his analysis. First, he claims that the Catholic church needs liberating influences to retain the flock... but where are Catholics going? The three largest non-Catholic groups in Mexico are the Luz del Mundo, the Jehova's Witnesses, and the Latter-day Saints (Mormons): all three of which are far more conservative than Catholicism (and, frankly, their services aren't exactly rock concerts of entertainment is a factor). They are also religions that maintain a fair amount of rigid and predictable ceremony in their worship. I would suggest that the madre iglesia is losing members that find the social doctrine of Catholicism too liberal - let alone the few remnants of liberation theology still bouncing around out there. In terms of sex, however, he may be spot on regarding contraception and new concepts of marital conjugal relations as beneficial instead of cause for shame.

Second, I think his failure to mention the politics and scandals of the Catholic church is an important oversight. If people feel their contributions will be misused or their sense of sexual identity assaulted, they will vote with their feet. As Max Weber points out, patriarchy is only functional when the patriarch wields power from a position of higher moral ground... as soon as that erodes the followers either do away with the patriarch or they go find a new one.

I would also point out that research from Bolivia, Chile, Brazil, Guatemala, and Haiti has all shown that while you can see mass conversion, retention of that conversion is only around 40%. Most of the rest will drift back to Catholicism. However, one thing I liked about Blancarte's analysis is that it does rightly show that 5% of Mexicans profess no religion - but that does not necessarily mean atheism. As the Catholics have feared for years, many leave the church, try out another religion (or several), and eventually drift out of organized religion completely.

Domes of Evil: Arizona and Luz Del Mundo

A Phoenix area Luz del Mundo (LDM) church is under attack - for being a mosque. The evangelical christian group based in Guadalajara, Mexico, is essentially a neo-pentecostal movement (founded in 1926 they were neo-pentecostal before it was cool) that embraces biblical literalism, Jesus Christ as savior from sin through his grace and baptism in his name alone, and with a modern apostle on the earth today. In short, there is enough doctrinal similarity between Arizona's evangelicals and Mormons to make them fit in quite nicely in that religiously conservative state. Unfortunately, they have a dome on their church.

Since the distinctive dome shape went up, church leaders said they have received phone calls from concerned neighbors who’ve mistaken the building for an Islamic mosque. READ MORE HERE

The group has placed a banner up on the dome stating that they are "building a christian house of prayer." I'm not sure what disturbs me more - that a dome suddenly becomes an evil structure or the implication that if the group building the dome wasn't LDM it would be ok to be concerned.

See a related (but different) Phoenix News Times article here.

Northern Luz

The Anchorage Daily News reported last month that a Luz del Mundo temple in Anchorage made of corrugated tin has stalled. The church, at a cost of $1.7 million to the local congregation of 35, is designed to look like the church's central temple in Guadalajara's Hermosa Provincia colony. I was struck by a couple of thoughts.
1) the comments from the readers were overwhelmingly negative, with one commentator on a related story on the temple wondering if the building was a front for drug runners and illegal aliens. LDM is probably Mexico's closest approximation of the sort of Christianity you will find practiced by many in Alaska, such as Palin's former Wasila Assembly of God church. LDM are probably conservative Alaskans' greatest allies in terms of "issues" - but they certainly can't see beyond the racial profiling.
2) Not far from San Antonio the Luz del Mundo maintain a lavish exotic animal park and collection of vintage cars (see the San Antonio News Express story here) - an odd juxtaposition to the 4 year struggle of the Alaska congregation to finish its building. While I appreciate the interesting idea of Mexican wealth needing to prop up insufficient funds in the US, I am also struck by the lack of central planning in an otherwise very tightly controlled centralized church. Perhaps LDM is not the religious juggernaut that I and others have made it out to be. Apparently, according to the ADN story, this is not the only stalled church in the works. Perhaps, of course, I am just reading too much into a policy of asking local congregations to take control of the their own building facilities.

Luz Del Mundo and Adult Education - WARNING: A Personal Indulgence Post

Living in the bubble of faculty, students, and academic colleagues I forget how really cool our job can be sometimes.

I just spoke this evening at the Unity Church for their religion lecture series. After finishing my presentation I was grilled for 40 minutes about the Luz Del Mundo organization based out of Guadalajara, Mexico. I rarely sit in front of an audience of non-academic adults (the over 30 set), and their enthusiasm for the topic was refreshing. While I understand that my only real claim to fame is having married a really good baker, today I participated in helping a few people understand the world around them a little better, and that feels really good. I get a little tired of academic panels where some @$ always gets up and says "I understand you only had twenty minutes, and I appreciate your focus was on topic X, but what I REALLY wanted to know was topic Y." Next time FAX me in advance, pendejo.

I think I will start a small series on Luz Del Mundo with some basic observations on this (alleged) Mexican religious juggernaut. With even the most basic membership numbers in dispute, this baby is a real hot potato.