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Church and Politics in Brazil: The Genesis of Change*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Thomas C. Bruneau
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Extract

The Catholic Church in Brazil has undergone a fundamental transformation in its role in state and society during the past decade and a half, making it probably the most progressive Church in Latin America, if not the world. Based on theological innovations since the Second Vatican Council (1962–5) and the CELAM meeting in Medellín, Colombia (1968), the Church in Brazil has made a ‘preferential option for the poor’.

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Articles
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 17 , Issue 2 , November 1985 , pp. 271 - 293
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1985

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References

1 For my analyses, see The Political Transformation of the Brazilian Catholic Church (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1974),Google Scholar and The Church in Brazil: The Politics of Religion (Austin, The University of Texas Press, 1982).Google Scholar For documentation, see Luiz Gonzaga de, Souza Lima, Evolução política dos católicos e da igreja no Brasil (Petrópolis, Vozes, 1979).Google Scholar For a very useful review of the activities, see Cândido Procópio Ferreira de Camargo, Beatriz Muniz de Souza, and Antíonio Flávio de Oliveira Pierucci, ‘La Iglesia católica en el Brasil: 1945–1970’, Revista Mexicana de Sociologiâ No. xliii (1981). For a recent review, see Dom, Aloisio Lorscheider, ‘Informe para o CELAM pelo delegado da CNBB’, SEDOC, Vol. 16 (07–08, 1983), pp. 86–97.Google Scholar Other relevant books include: Marcio, Moreira Alves, A igreja e a politica no Brasil (Rio de Janeiro, Civilização Brasileira, 1979),Google ScholarRoberto, Romano, Brasil: igreja contra estado (São Paulo, Kairos, 1979),Google Scholar and Helena, Salem (ed.), Brasil: A igreja dos oprimidos (São Paulo, Brasil Debates, 1981).Google Scholar

2 On the CNBB the definitive canon law study is by Pe Gervasio Fernandes de, Queiroga, Conferêcia nacional dos bispos do Brasil (São Paulo, Ediçõ;es Paulinas, 1977).Google Scholar

3 ‘Comunicaçao Pastoral ao Povo de Deus’, November, 1976.

4 CNBB, Exigências Cristãs de uma ordem polílica (São Paulo, Edições Paulinas, 1978).Google Scholar

5 CNBB, ‘Subsídios para Puebla’, Itaici, 18–2504 1978.Google Scholar See also the many analyses of the initial Puebla, document in Revista Eclesiástica Brasileira, vol. 38, no. 149 (03 1978)Google Scholar and Libanio, J. B., ‘A III Conferência Geral do Episcopado Latino-Americano’, Síntese no. 12, (01/03, 1978).Google Scholar

6 CNBB, Subsídios para uma política social (São Paulo, Ediçõ;es Paulinas, 1979).Google Scholar

7 CNBB, Igreja e problemas da terra (São Paulo, Ediç;ões Paulinas, 1980).Google Scholar

8 CNBB, ‘Solo urbano e açāo pastoral’ (02, 1982).Google Scholar

9 CNBB, ‘Reflexão Cristã sobre a conjuntura política’ (08, 1981).Google Scholar

10 In addition to chapter 8 in my 1982 book, and the bibliography cited there, see CEBRAP, ‘Comunidades eclesiais de base’, 1979. Mimeo.

11 This estimate is from Leonardo, Boff, Igreja: Carisma e poder (Petrópolis, Vozes, 1981), p. 197.Google Scholar

12 For a specific case study see my ‘Brazil: The Catholic Church and the Basic Christian Communities. A Case Study from the Brazilian Amazon’, in Daniel, H. Levine (ed,), Popular Religion, the Churches, and Political Conflict in Latin America (Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, forthcoming).Google Scholar

13 This point is made in Fernando, B. Avila, ‘A igreja na crise brasileira’, Síntese, no. 28 (05–06, 1983), pp. 7–24.Google Scholar

14 See my 1974 book, chapter, 4, and Brian, Smith, The Church and Politics in Chile: Challenges to Modern Catholicism (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1982).Google Scholar For a strong analysis of contrasting cases, see Daniel H., Levine, Religion and Politics in Latin America: The Catholic Church in Venezuela and Colombia (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1981).Google Scholar

15 On many of the Church's activities during the dictatorship, see Helena, Salem (ed.) Brasil: A igreja dos oprimidos (São Paulo, Brasil Debates, 1981).Google Scholar

16 Philip, Selznick, Leadership in Administration (Evanston, Rowe, Peterson and Co., 1957),Google ScholarDaniel, Katz and Robert, Khan, The Social Psychology of Organisations (New York, Wiley, 1966);Google ScholarChester, Barnard, The Functions of the Executive (Cambridge, Havard University Press, 1938),Google Scholar and James, Thompson, Organizations in Action (New York, McGraw Hill, 1967).Google Scholar

17 See my ‘Power and Influence: Analysis of the Church in Latin America and the Case of Brazil’, Latin American Research Review vol. 8 (Summer, 1973), pp. 25–51.Google Scholar

18 de Souza Luiz, Alberto G., ‘Igreja a sociedade: elementos para um marco teórico’, Síntese vol. 13 (04–06, 1978) p. 19.Google Scholar

19 See my The Church in Brazil pp. 6–8.Google Scholar

20 See my Political Transformation, p. 240.Google Scholar

21 Classes populares e igreja nos caminbos da bistória (Petrépolis, Vozes, 1982).Google Scholar

22 ‘Igreja e Sociedade’, p. 25.

23 Classes populares, p. 240.Google Scholar

24 Carlos, Palàcio, ‘Uma consciencia histórica irrevérsivel (1960–1979: duas décadas de história de igreja no Brasil)’, Síntese, No. 17 (09–12, 1979), pp. 19–40.Google Scholar

25 Luiz Gonzaga de, Souza Lima, ‘Evoluçião política' and same ‘Comunidades Eclesiais de Base’, Revista de Cultura Vozes, 74 (06–07, 1980), p. 402.Google Scholar

26 On Gramsci, see, for example, Gramsci, A., Selections from the Prison Notebooks (ed. by Hoareand, Q.Nowell-Smith, G.) (New York, International Publishers, 1971);Google ScholarPortelli, H., Gramsci et le bloc historique (Paris, PUF, 1972);Google ScholarPortelli, H., Gramsci et la question réligieuse (Paris, Anthropos, 1977);Google ScholarLeszek, Kolakowski, Main Currents of Marxism, vol. 3, pp. 220–52Google Scholar on Gramsci, (Oxford, OUP, 1978),Google Scholar and Sassoon, Anne S., Gramsci's Politics (N.Y., St Martin's Press, 1980).Google Scholar

27 Paulo, Krischke, ‘Proposal for the Study of the Church's Role in the 1964 Brazilian Political Crisis’. Working Paper no. 7 (12, 1983) (The Kellogg Institute, University of Notre Dame), p. 16.Google Scholar

28 Kolakowski, , III, p. 236.Google Scholar

29 Ibid., p. 225.

30 For this reason I am not at all impressed with the gratuitous suggestion by one reviewer of my book as well as Levine's and Smith's that we look more closely at Gramsci for a ‘well unified theory or method of study’. See Thomas, Bamat, ‘The Catholic Church and Latin American Politics’ Latin American Research Review, vol. 15, no. 3 (Fall, 1983), p. 226.Google Scholar It should be noted that the example of analysis promoted by Bamat, , Otto, Maduro, Religion and Social Conflicts (Maryknoll, Orbis Books, 1982) is an eclectic Marxist analysis in which Gramsci is not predominant. The book is more a philosophical treatise than an empirical analysis.Google Scholar

31 Carlos Rodrigues, Brandão, Os deuses do povo (São Paulo, Brasiliense, 1980). One of the most impressive of the bottom to the top approaches, by an anthropologist whose sympathy for the lower classes he is studying is obvious, reaches conclusions very similar to my own on the Church changing to adopt to different circumstances in order to maintain influence in society.Google Scholar

32 Scott, Mainwaring, ‘Igreja e política: anatoçóes teóricas’, Síntese, No. 27 (01–04, 1983), pp. 35–56,Google Scholar and his thesis, ‘The Catholic Church and Politics in Brazil, 1916–1982, Stanford University, Department of Political Science (1982), to be published by Stanford University Press.Google Scholar

33 Ibid., pp. 38–9.

34 Ibid., p. 38.

35 See, for example of this awareness, CNBB, Diretrizes gerais da açāo pastoral da igreja no Brasil, 1975/1978 (Sã Paulo, Paulinas, 1975).Google Scholar

36 Mainwaring, ‘Igreja e Política’.

37 See Bruneau, , Political Transformation, 1974, p. 4 for a discussion of this.Google Scholar

38 Avery, Dulles S.J., A Church to Believe In (New York, Crossroads, 1982), Chapter 2, ‘Institution and Charism in the Church’.Google Scholar