The issue seems to me to be not whether the church is growing, but whether it is authentically engaged in the mission of the triune God in its concrete socio-historical situations. It is a matter of efficacious participation in the ongoing life struggles of society in a total witnessing engagement, which, more than a program or a method, is a lifestyle. For when this happens, the church is turned upside-down [a living organism] … [and] inside-out [at the service of
the kingdom].1
We had read each other’s work, shared lectures in our classrooms, walked the streets of Los Angeles together as Christian activists, and influenced each other through our sermons in the church we both belong to. Then an opportunity presented itself to travel together to a place radically different from our familiar contexts. The trip promised to challenge our theological presuppositions and pastoral praxis. So, we went—to the memorable colonial city of San Cristóbal de Las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico.
On our trip, we (Marcos and Oscar) were joined by Dr. Robert Chao Romero, associate professor of Chicana/o studies at UCLA and director of the Brown Church Institute. We were not sure of what to expect in Chiapas. But we knew that San Cristóbal de Las Casas has been known as the hub of colonial resistance since the time of Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas (16th c.). We also knew that Chiapas was the home of the Zapatista movement, solidified in 1994 to resist ethnic oppression, extractivist corporative agendas, and political corruption.
The trip had at least two goals. Marcos and Robert were looking for the legacy of Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, to deepen their historical knowledge of him and his impact on society as part of their continued reflection in their recently published book.2 Oscar was looking for the Zapatista movement, to gain knowledge of their ethnopolitical project toward self-sustainability and its impact on marginalized communities around the world. We all found something that we were originally curious about. We were surrounded by historical colonial artifacts, as the city itself is a walking archive. We also engaged in discussions about the effects of the Zapatista dictum, “a world in which many worlds fit,” beyond their caracol3 communities. But we also found much more.
The Collective Behind Each Agent of Change
We learned that San Cristóbal is a hub for thousands of NGOs with all kinds of agendas. Many have their headquarters abroad, are financially stable, and have many of their leaders only temporarily assigned to specific projects (with the possibility of relocation at any time). They have little alignment and intersectionality with local organizations, specifically with long-term advocacy, so the organizations’ self-centered projects often compete with the often less-consulted local organizations and the indigenous communities’ priorities. So while the colonial and tourist-lined streets intended to present a certain face of San Cristóbal, we found that indigenous communities continue to be in the struggle for land, water, and human dignity.
Ramona, an indigenous activist and faith-rooted collective (community) organizer, showed us the variety of local faces that embodied the longings and losses of indigenous communities within and around San Cristóbal. Ramona4 connected us to a rich web of other agents of transformation: indigenous Christian leaders, activists, human rights workers, and lay Christian leaders doing amazing work with minimal to no financial and church support. Ramona’s accompaniment of local activists, entrepreneurial skills to train small business owners, and theological commitment to justice as God’s work introduced us to models of church renewal and community transformation. We went to San Cristóbal de Las Casas looking for Bartolomé de Las Casas and the Zapatista project, and instead we met and were transformed by Ramona, our “Lidia of Chiapas” (Acts 16:11–15). We also learned from Itzel, a locally trained anthropologist who started a small collective of women taxi drivers in response to the sexual assault, harassment, and violence that local women and young girls experience as they try to get around the city.5 Elvira and Moisés expanded our imagination on how “another world is possible” through social-conscience illustrations, art as resistance, sustainable gardening and farming practices, bartering markets, and the usage of an alternative currency, túmin.6 Elvira and Moisés, through their collective Alter_Nativas, coordinate tiangüis7 where túmin is accepted and where neighbors become partners instead of clients.
When Social Location Changes Christian Vocation: The Case for Reverse Conversion
I (Oscar) was deeply impressed by the stories of conversion to the indigenous peoples, histories, cultures, and struggles. To be clear, I am not referring to the indigenous conversion to Christianity but the opposite. I am referring to the power of reverse Christian conversion: how influential Christian leaders—from Las Casas (16th c.) to jTatik Samuel Ruíz García (1924–2011) to Father Marcelo Pérez Pérez8 (in the present)—have been converted to the indigenous peoples, their contexts, and struggles. This seems to be connected to one of the theological insights gained in Vatican II by committed Latin American pastoral agents such as jTatik9 Samuel Ruíz García: the evangelical understanding that their Christian vocation has changed location, from the metropolitan urban center of Westernized life to the marginal indigenous and impoverished back alleys of the city. Hence, the so-called preferential option for the poor, in jTatik’s context, translates into a total commitment to the indigenous peoples deemed as the unwanted of society. These fathers and mothers of the Latin American church have learned to love God in the indigenous other and love the indigenous other in God. They have learned their languages and embraced their struggles. They have committed to advocate on their behalf and fought next to them in their revolutions.
I was also impressed by how even atheist political intellectuals, such as Subcomandante Marcos, were equally converted to the indigenous peoples to the point of delinking from their Westernized political ideologies and adopting the indigenous cosmologies of liberation. I was deeply impressed by our hosts, a family of indigenous descent who were members of a historic Protestant denomination until they could no longer continue their membership because the synod would not ordain an indigenous, theologically trained woman and could not tolerate the indigenous activism of their university-trained son. All of them, past or present, had witnessed the power of Life in the indigenous peoples and their contexts.
When Faith is Not Separated from Justice: The Case for Restauración Integral
I (Marcos) noticed that throughout our time in San Cristóbal, the word “acompañamiento” (accompaniment) was widely used. Ramona, Itzel, and other indigenous local activists referred to their work as coming alongside the concerns of their communities. “Acompañar los procesos y las personas”10 point to the attentiveness and embodied presence that these leaders model in the midst of lo cotidiano and las luchas.11 To practice acompañamiento, proximity is necessary. Proximity clarifies the causes and the policies behind las luchas, and it continues to assess one’s temptations with power: the power to dictate change, finance change, or even lead change. These indigenous leaders’ proximity to their communities generated a sensitivity toward seeing the face of Christ in the plights of their neighbors and ancestors. San Cristóbal de Las Casas holds lived memories, ongoing systemic racism, exclusionary government policies, forced displacement from ancestral lands, and the complicit relationship of institutionalized religion in the erasure of indigenous cultures and languages. Hence, the process of accompaniment does not allow for these realities to go unnoticed or unattended; you can’t stay on the sidelines when proximity to indigenous communities reveals God’s heart for justice, dignity, and liberty. This is where jTatik Samuel Ruíz García brings forth a prophetic-pastoral model for the integration of faith and justice.
In his process of accompaniment with indigenous communities as the bishop of the dioceses of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, jTatik Samuel listened. Escuchando—listening and continually listening—became distinctive of his pastoral work.12As one of his biographers recounts, jTatik Samuel witnessed a heated fight between two Tzotzils13 in San Cristóbal’s plaza, and he heard how what escalated this brawl was the insult, “¡sos un indio!”14 The presence of internalized racism in this account as well as the colonial heritage of the sistemas de castas15 (which prevented indigenous communities from owning and benefiting from their ancestral lands) converted jTatik Samuel toward a more participatory and inclusive pastoral en conjunto. jTatik Samuel recognized that due to the complexity of social issues in Chiapas, “Jamás se podría tener un plan de pastoral adecuado sin la participación de aquellas personas que están cerca de estos problemas.”16 It is precisely the participation, the voice, and the inclusion of indigenous communities that energized action groups that weaved together the Word of God with the work of God. Indigenous community members, pastoral lay agents, and clergy all collaborated in the discernment and mobilizing processes towards the pursuit of restauración integral.17
And this transformed pastoral leadership toward commitments and action—specifically towards the restoration of indigenous communities’ access to and caring of land and the restoration of a right relationship with la Madre Tierra18 as caretakers and not peons. A holistic restoration of one’s dignity concerning community and land were ancestral values that echoed reign of God values, a connection that emerged when the Word questioned present realities of injustice and also announced liberating processes of justice and redemption in the life and ministry of Jesus. Here is where a pastoral en conjunto19 emerged—the weaving of the work and Word of God to infuse the pursuit of restauración integral and to encourage the collective participation of the priesthood of all believers.
Evangel-Rooted Neutrality: The Case for Obedient Leadership Over Tyrant Power
On the basis of a chiapaneco ecumenical activism, the pursuit of pastoral en conjunto in San Cristóbal transversed faith traditions, affecting even those with no religious affiliation. Everyone knew that jTatik Samuel’s unwavering faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God mobilized his commitments. They also acknowledged how the Word of God from the hermeneutics of indigenous communities, indigenous women, and Guatemalan immigrants (taking refuge in his parish during the 1990s) reshaped his concept of power. That is, church power as service rather than domination on the basis of evangelical neutrality. But here, evangelical neutrality does not translate into politics of silence or complicity, but instead, “Evangelical neutrality is on the side of justice, on the side of truth, and not on the side of partialities that would want to pull truth or justice to their own polarizing and self-benefiting interpretations.”20 This evangelical neutrality led jTatik Samuel to facilitate social healing by mediating peace talks successfully and supporting the autonomy of indigenous territories in Chiapas.21 As the Zapatista usually put it: The key is to lead by obeying, instead of to lead by dictating.
Compas en Misión (Companions in Mission)
As we think of the lessons that our compas en misión in San Cristobal de Las Casas have shared with us, allow us to point to some rumbos (routes) that are paradigmatic when it comes to church renewal.
The Legacy of Violent Theologies
Joining the Spirit in local contexts reminds us that we are not the bringers of the good news to a specific group of people. The Spirit is at work in specific localities being the good news, and our role of discerning the Spirit in such lived realities convicts the church of its own need for evangelization. In addition, we are not innocently sharing our portion of the good news with unreached or unchurched populations, for we Westernized Christians carry a wounded Christian imagination with traces of colonial history and methods. The colonial matrix of power that supported the genocide and conquest of indigenous communities throughout this continent revolved around the domination of land, bodies, and knowledge. This domination needed a violent theology to legitimize itself: At first, it was expressed as a doctrine of discovery22 and more recently as a doctrine of salvation through the apparatus of Western development and capitalism. Identifying the legacy and rhetoric of such violent theologies in our midst is one of the most urgent tasks for the renewal of the church. These violent theologies have infiltrated our understanding of church planting, evangelism, pastoral leadership, and organizational structures. Lament repentance practices of complicity in these theologies and delinking from such genocidal doctrines are the first steps toward evangel-rooted church renewal and a reconciliación integral that integrates the Word and work of God in concrete justice-seeking processes of accompaniment and transformation.
Re-Imagining Missional Models Transnationally
Another route that the Spirit invites us to join is the “leavening” of our imagination regarding missional initiatives. Our mission theology must take seriously our first point—the legacy of violent theologies—and the fact that our role is to follow the lead of the Spirit as incarnated in the very communities we are called to partner with. Perhaps this means becoming the passengers rather than the drivers of missions and supporting indigenous and local leaders from the place of participatory kinship. Put simply, transnational missional models push against our concepts of borders (national, institutional, budgetary, and denominational) and facilitate a communion-based hermandad (kinship). Echoing Jesus’ words of inclusive, participatory kinship (Mark 3:31–35), an hermandad of equals embodying the Word and work of God strengthens our familial vínculos (bonds). These bonds enliven our commitment to faith-rooted justice work in San Cristóbal and Pasadena. This releases tremendous self-renewing energy to the church.
“Another Church is Possible”
We are part of the same local church, La Fuente Ministries, in Pasadena, California. Part of our task in reflecting on church renewal is considering these routes in our particular church context. For example, violent theologies have led us to see how often we prioritize our self-identification as Latina/o/x mestizas/os (bilingual, intercultural, multiethnic, etc.). This mestizaje, while helpful to express the hybridity of races, cultures, and ethnicities, may also tend to make invisible the presence and gift of our indigenous roots. As a diasporic church, with a predominantly Latina/o/x presence, we are tempted to speak of marginality and solidarity about our own immigrant experience while simultaneously ignoring the varying levels of marginality that others experience. For example, the lack of land acknowledgment toward the Tongva indigenous community upon this land that we now call Pasadena. Or the continuous obstacles that Protestant denominations impose upon indigenous women in the Global South who pursue ordination. Or the complicit attitude of many local churches in Pasadena to establish private Christian schools in response to a desegregated public school system.
This reroutes our hermeneutical practices concerning Scripture. As a congregation, we already practice congregational Lectio Divina twice a quarter. This practice moves toward a more interpretive community of Scripture resembling a pastoral en conjunto, where one interpretive voice (often of a male preacher) is replaced by the multidimensional move of the Spirit within and across generations, cultures, genders, and ethnicities. Congregational Lectio Divina already forms us as a people that seek to pay attention to the Spirit, each other, and our contexts. Yet after our experience in San Cristóbal, it has become more urgent to lean into this practice, as we need to constantly unearth our violent theologies that have shaped many of our Christian experiences.
The possibility of transnational missional models (reciprocal kinship) has strengthened our hermandad between the indigenous leaders in San Cristóbal de Las Casas and our local church in Pasadena. As compas en misión, in Pasadena and San Cristóbal, our hermandad reveals how our right-relatedness to land, bodies, and knowledge are spaces of renewal and hope. We are being reinstructed by our indigenous sisters and brothers as to the ties between discipleship and creation care, alternative jubilee economics, and the Spirit-filled wisdom of el buen vivir.23 Our bonds in Christ, through the Word and work of God, renew our imaginations on how to embody the love of God and our neighbor. We mutually encourage and re-envision alternatives in las luchas and in lo cotidiano, a Spirit-filled invitation to be compas en misión so that another world—and church—is possible.
Oscar García-Johnson is professor of theology and Latino/a studies and Fuller’s chief of diversity, equity, and inclusion. He previously served as the academic dean for the Center for the Study of Hispanic Church and Community (Centro Latino). An experienced minister, Dr. García-Johnson is also involved in faith-rooted holistic justice with Matthew 25 of Southern California, LA RED, and CCDA and is cofounder of Omega Geñeration. He is the author of multiple books, including a new multivolume work, Teología del Nuevo Mundo.
Marcos Canales has been pastoring amongst the Latina community of Los Angeles for almost two decades. He has also worked in the areas of community-based youth development, immigration advocacy, leadership coaching and theological education. Marcos is pastor of La Fuente Ministries, a bilingual, intercultural, and intergenerational congregation in Pasadena, California. He received his MDiv from Fuller Seminary, and his most recent publication is a co-authored book entitled Las Casas on Faithful Witness.
The issue seems to me to be not whether the church is growing, but whether it is authentically engaged in the mission of the triune God in its concrete socio-historical situations. It is a matter of efficacious participation in the ongoing life struggles of society in a total witnessing engagement, which, more than a program or a method, is a lifestyle. For when this happens, the church is turned upside-down [a living organism] … [and] inside-out [at the service of
the kingdom].1
We had read each other’s work, shared lectures in our classrooms, walked the streets of Los Angeles together as Christian activists, and influenced each other through our sermons in the church we both belong to. Then an opportunity presented itself to travel together to a place radically different from our familiar contexts. The trip promised to challenge our theological presuppositions and pastoral praxis. So, we went—to the memorable colonial city of San Cristóbal de Las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico.
On our trip, we (Marcos and Oscar) were joined by Dr. Robert Chao Romero, associate professor of Chicana/o studies at UCLA and director of the Brown Church Institute. We were not sure of what to expect in Chiapas. But we knew that San Cristóbal de Las Casas has been known as the hub of colonial resistance since the time of Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas (16th c.). We also knew that Chiapas was the home of the Zapatista movement, solidified in 1994 to resist ethnic oppression, extractivist corporative agendas, and political corruption.
The trip had at least two goals. Marcos and Robert were looking for the legacy of Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, to deepen their historical knowledge of him and his impact on society as part of their continued reflection in their recently published book.2 Oscar was looking for the Zapatista movement, to gain knowledge of their ethnopolitical project toward self-sustainability and its impact on marginalized communities around the world. We all found something that we were originally curious about. We were surrounded by historical colonial artifacts, as the city itself is a walking archive. We also engaged in discussions about the effects of the Zapatista dictum, “a world in which many worlds fit,” beyond their caracol3 communities. But we also found much more.
The Collective Behind Each Agent of Change
We learned that San Cristóbal is a hub for thousands of NGOs with all kinds of agendas. Many have their headquarters abroad, are financially stable, and have many of their leaders only temporarily assigned to specific projects (with the possibility of relocation at any time). They have little alignment and intersectionality with local organizations, specifically with long-term advocacy, so the organizations’ self-centered projects often compete with the often less-consulted local organizations and the indigenous communities’ priorities. So while the colonial and tourist-lined streets intended to present a certain face of San Cristóbal, we found that indigenous communities continue to be in the struggle for land, water, and human dignity.
Ramona, an indigenous activist and faith-rooted collective (community) organizer, showed us the variety of local faces that embodied the longings and losses of indigenous communities within and around San Cristóbal. Ramona4 connected us to a rich web of other agents of transformation: indigenous Christian leaders, activists, human rights workers, and lay Christian leaders doing amazing work with minimal to no financial and church support. Ramona’s accompaniment of local activists, entrepreneurial skills to train small business owners, and theological commitment to justice as God’s work introduced us to models of church renewal and community transformation. We went to San Cristóbal de Las Casas looking for Bartolomé de Las Casas and the Zapatista project, and instead we met and were transformed by Ramona, our “Lidia of Chiapas” (Acts 16:11–15). We also learned from Itzel, a locally trained anthropologist who started a small collective of women taxi drivers in response to the sexual assault, harassment, and violence that local women and young girls experience as they try to get around the city.5 Elvira and Moisés expanded our imagination on how “another world is possible” through social-conscience illustrations, art as resistance, sustainable gardening and farming practices, bartering markets, and the usage of an alternative currency, túmin.6 Elvira and Moisés, through their collective Alter_Nativas, coordinate tiangüis7 where túmin is accepted and where neighbors become partners instead of clients.
When Social Location Changes Christian Vocation: The Case for Reverse Conversion
I (Oscar) was deeply impressed by the stories of conversion to the indigenous peoples, histories, cultures, and struggles. To be clear, I am not referring to the indigenous conversion to Christianity but the opposite. I am referring to the power of reverse Christian conversion: how influential Christian leaders—from Las Casas (16th c.) to jTatik Samuel Ruíz García (1924–2011) to Father Marcelo Pérez Pérez8 (in the present)—have been converted to the indigenous peoples, their contexts, and struggles. This seems to be connected to one of the theological insights gained in Vatican II by committed Latin American pastoral agents such as jTatik9 Samuel Ruíz García: the evangelical understanding that their Christian vocation has changed location, from the metropolitan urban center of Westernized life to the marginal indigenous and impoverished back alleys of the city. Hence, the so-called preferential option for the poor, in jTatik’s context, translates into a total commitment to the indigenous peoples deemed as the unwanted of society. These fathers and mothers of the Latin American church have learned to love God in the indigenous other and love the indigenous other in God. They have learned their languages and embraced their struggles. They have committed to advocate on their behalf and fought next to them in their revolutions.
I was also impressed by how even atheist political intellectuals, such as Subcomandante Marcos, were equally converted to the indigenous peoples to the point of delinking from their Westernized political ideologies and adopting the indigenous cosmologies of liberation. I was deeply impressed by our hosts, a family of indigenous descent who were members of a historic Protestant denomination until they could no longer continue their membership because the synod would not ordain an indigenous, theologically trained woman and could not tolerate the indigenous activism of their university-trained son. All of them, past or present, had witnessed the power of Life in the indigenous peoples and their contexts.
When Faith is Not Separated from Justice: The Case for Restauración Integral
I (Marcos) noticed that throughout our time in San Cristóbal, the word “acompañamiento” (accompaniment) was widely used. Ramona, Itzel, and other indigenous local activists referred to their work as coming alongside the concerns of their communities. “Acompañar los procesos y las personas”10 point to the attentiveness and embodied presence that these leaders model in the midst of lo cotidiano and las luchas.11 To practice acompañamiento, proximity is necessary. Proximity clarifies the causes and the policies behind las luchas, and it continues to assess one’s temptations with power: the power to dictate change, finance change, or even lead change. These indigenous leaders’ proximity to their communities generated a sensitivity toward seeing the face of Christ in the plights of their neighbors and ancestors. San Cristóbal de Las Casas holds lived memories, ongoing systemic racism, exclusionary government policies, forced displacement from ancestral lands, and the complicit relationship of institutionalized religion in the erasure of indigenous cultures and languages. Hence, the process of accompaniment does not allow for these realities to go unnoticed or unattended; you can’t stay on the sidelines when proximity to indigenous communities reveals God’s heart for justice, dignity, and liberty. This is where jTatik Samuel Ruíz García brings forth a prophetic-pastoral model for the integration of faith and justice.
In his process of accompaniment with indigenous communities as the bishop of the dioceses of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, jTatik Samuel listened. Escuchando—listening and continually listening—became distinctive of his pastoral work.12As one of his biographers recounts, jTatik Samuel witnessed a heated fight between two Tzotzils13 in San Cristóbal’s plaza, and he heard how what escalated this brawl was the insult, “¡sos un indio!”14 The presence of internalized racism in this account as well as the colonial heritage of the sistemas de castas15 (which prevented indigenous communities from owning and benefiting from their ancestral lands) converted jTatik Samuel toward a more participatory and inclusive pastoral en conjunto. jTatik Samuel recognized that due to the complexity of social issues in Chiapas, “Jamás se podría tener un plan de pastoral adecuado sin la participación de aquellas personas que están cerca de estos problemas.”16 It is precisely the participation, the voice, and the inclusion of indigenous communities that energized action groups that weaved together the Word of God with the work of God. Indigenous community members, pastoral lay agents, and clergy all collaborated in the discernment and mobilizing processes towards the pursuit of restauración integral.17
And this transformed pastoral leadership toward commitments and action—specifically towards the restoration of indigenous communities’ access to and caring of land and the restoration of a right relationship with la Madre Tierra18 as caretakers and not peons. A holistic restoration of one’s dignity concerning community and land were ancestral values that echoed reign of God values, a connection that emerged when the Word questioned present realities of injustice and also announced liberating processes of justice and redemption in the life and ministry of Jesus. Here is where a pastoral en conjunto19 emerged—the weaving of the work and Word of God to infuse the pursuit of restauración integral and to encourage the collective participation of the priesthood of all believers.
Evangel-Rooted Neutrality: The Case for Obedient Leadership Over Tyrant Power
On the basis of a chiapaneco ecumenical activism, the pursuit of pastoral en conjunto in San Cristóbal transversed faith traditions, affecting even those with no religious affiliation. Everyone knew that jTatik Samuel’s unwavering faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God mobilized his commitments. They also acknowledged how the Word of God from the hermeneutics of indigenous communities, indigenous women, and Guatemalan immigrants (taking refuge in his parish during the 1990s) reshaped his concept of power. That is, church power as service rather than domination on the basis of evangelical neutrality. But here, evangelical neutrality does not translate into politics of silence or complicity, but instead, “Evangelical neutrality is on the side of justice, on the side of truth, and not on the side of partialities that would want to pull truth or justice to their own polarizing and self-benefiting interpretations.”20 This evangelical neutrality led jTatik Samuel to facilitate social healing by mediating peace talks successfully and supporting the autonomy of indigenous territories in Chiapas.21 As the Zapatista usually put it: The key is to lead by obeying, instead of to lead by dictating.
Compas en Misión (Companions in Mission)
As we think of the lessons that our compas en misión in San Cristobal de Las Casas have shared with us, allow us to point to some rumbos (routes) that are paradigmatic when it comes to church renewal.
The Legacy of Violent Theologies
Joining the Spirit in local contexts reminds us that we are not the bringers of the good news to a specific group of people. The Spirit is at work in specific localities being the good news, and our role of discerning the Spirit in such lived realities convicts the church of its own need for evangelization. In addition, we are not innocently sharing our portion of the good news with unreached or unchurched populations, for we Westernized Christians carry a wounded Christian imagination with traces of colonial history and methods. The colonial matrix of power that supported the genocide and conquest of indigenous communities throughout this continent revolved around the domination of land, bodies, and knowledge. This domination needed a violent theology to legitimize itself: At first, it was expressed as a doctrine of discovery22 and more recently as a doctrine of salvation through the apparatus of Western development and capitalism. Identifying the legacy and rhetoric of such violent theologies in our midst is one of the most urgent tasks for the renewal of the church. These violent theologies have infiltrated our understanding of church planting, evangelism, pastoral leadership, and organizational structures. Lament repentance practices of complicity in these theologies and delinking from such genocidal doctrines are the first steps toward evangel-rooted church renewal and a reconciliación integral that integrates the Word and work of God in concrete justice-seeking processes of accompaniment and transformation.
Re-Imagining Missional Models Transnationally
Another route that the Spirit invites us to join is the “leavening” of our imagination regarding missional initiatives. Our mission theology must take seriously our first point—the legacy of violent theologies—and the fact that our role is to follow the lead of the Spirit as incarnated in the very communities we are called to partner with. Perhaps this means becoming the passengers rather than the drivers of missions and supporting indigenous and local leaders from the place of participatory kinship. Put simply, transnational missional models push against our concepts of borders (national, institutional, budgetary, and denominational) and facilitate a communion-based hermandad (kinship). Echoing Jesus’ words of inclusive, participatory kinship (Mark 3:31–35), an hermandad of equals embodying the Word and work of God strengthens our familial vínculos (bonds). These bonds enliven our commitment to faith-rooted justice work in San Cristóbal and Pasadena. This releases tremendous self-renewing energy to the church.
“Another Church is Possible”
We are part of the same local church, La Fuente Ministries, in Pasadena, California. Part of our task in reflecting on church renewal is considering these routes in our particular church context. For example, violent theologies have led us to see how often we prioritize our self-identification as Latina/o/x mestizas/os (bilingual, intercultural, multiethnic, etc.). This mestizaje, while helpful to express the hybridity of races, cultures, and ethnicities, may also tend to make invisible the presence and gift of our indigenous roots. As a diasporic church, with a predominantly Latina/o/x presence, we are tempted to speak of marginality and solidarity about our own immigrant experience while simultaneously ignoring the varying levels of marginality that others experience. For example, the lack of land acknowledgment toward the Tongva indigenous community upon this land that we now call Pasadena. Or the continuous obstacles that Protestant denominations impose upon indigenous women in the Global South who pursue ordination. Or the complicit attitude of many local churches in Pasadena to establish private Christian schools in response to a desegregated public school system.
This reroutes our hermeneutical practices concerning Scripture. As a congregation, we already practice congregational Lectio Divina twice a quarter. This practice moves toward a more interpretive community of Scripture resembling a pastoral en conjunto, where one interpretive voice (often of a male preacher) is replaced by the multidimensional move of the Spirit within and across generations, cultures, genders, and ethnicities. Congregational Lectio Divina already forms us as a people that seek to pay attention to the Spirit, each other, and our contexts. Yet after our experience in San Cristóbal, it has become more urgent to lean into this practice, as we need to constantly unearth our violent theologies that have shaped many of our Christian experiences.
The possibility of transnational missional models (reciprocal kinship) has strengthened our hermandad between the indigenous leaders in San Cristóbal de Las Casas and our local church in Pasadena. As compas en misión, in Pasadena and San Cristóbal, our hermandad reveals how our right-relatedness to land, bodies, and knowledge are spaces of renewal and hope. We are being reinstructed by our indigenous sisters and brothers as to the ties between discipleship and creation care, alternative jubilee economics, and the Spirit-filled wisdom of el buen vivir.23 Our bonds in Christ, through the Word and work of God, renew our imaginations on how to embody the love of God and our neighbor. We mutually encourage and re-envision alternatives in las luchas and in lo cotidiano, a Spirit-filled invitation to be compas en misión so that another world—and church—is possible.
Oscar García-Johnson is professor of theology and Latino/a studies and Fuller’s chief of diversity, equity, and inclusion. He previously served as the academic dean for the Center for the Study of Hispanic Church and Community (Centro Latino). An experienced minister, Dr. García-Johnson is also involved in faith-rooted holistic justice with Matthew 25 of Southern California, LA RED, and CCDA and is cofounder of Omega Geñeration. He is the author of multiple books, including a new multivolume work, Teología del Nuevo Mundo.
Marcos Canales has been pastoring amongst the Latina community of Los Angeles for almost two decades. He has also worked in the areas of community-based youth development, immigration advocacy, leadership coaching and theological education. Marcos is pastor of La Fuente Ministries, a bilingual, intercultural, and intergenerational congregation in Pasadena, California. He received his MDiv from Fuller Seminary, and his most recent publication is a co-authored book entitled Las Casas on Faithful Witness.
Robert Chao Romero, associate professor at UCLA, reflects on the revitalizing hope that immigrant churches bring to the church in the United States.
