Quote of the Week

"The theologians have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it."

Philip Berryman

Quote of the Week

"I am so tempted to give up on a Christianity where preachers from their pulpits preach a personal piety that ignores public responsibility. Like Muslim apologists who keep reminding us that true Islam does not condone terrorist acts, I am placed in the position of having to argue that true Christianity does not condone torture."

Read the full article here.

Miguel De La Torre
Associate Professor of Social Ethics at Iliff School of Theology

Lest We Forget: Remembering the Other 9/11

Today marks the 20th anniversary (September 11, 1988) of the destruction of St. Jean Bosco Church in the slums of Port-au-Prince. While Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide was giving mass, armed thugs working for the Henri Namphy regime entered the church and, in a siege that lasted several hours, massacred over twenty parishioners and injured many, many more before setting fire to the church. While Aristide managed to escape with his life, the incident eventually led to his expulsion from the Salesian order on December 15, 1988. Aristide, a liberation theologian and Roman Catholic priest, led the popular movement that led to the downfall of the Duvalier regime on February 7, 1986. Twenty years (and two not-so successful Aristide presidencies) later, Haiti continues to be mired in poverty and violence.

Let us continue to work for peace and justice for the Haitian people.

Converting the Church

"When we read the Book of Acts, all too often we misinterpret the book's central thesis. Most of us have been taught that Acts is the story about how the church converted the world to Jesus Christ. In reality, the book of Acts is the story as to how the church constantly had to be converted in order to make the message of Jesus Christ relevant to a hurting and spiritually hungry world."


Miguel De La Torre, author of Reading the Bible from the Margins and Associate Professor of Social Ethics at Iliff School of Theology

Read the rest of the article here. If you like this article, you might also be interested in reading this commentary or this study guide on the book of Acts.

Justo González on Revelation

"Why is it that a book that for its first readers was a word of comfort causes terror in us? Could it be that our place in the world and in society is very different from the position of those early Christians? Those churches in Asia looked upon the cataclysms announced in Revelation as a metaphor for their final vindication. It is difficult for us today to see things in the same light. Could it be that we have such an investment in the present order that we do not want it to pass away? Could it be that our perspective comes closer to that of 'the kings of the earth and the magnates and the generals and the rich and the powerful'? If we really saw and experienced the wickedness of the present order and were among the many who suffer as a consequence of that order would we not see its end with the same joy with which the first readers of Revelation were invited to see it?" (Italics mine)

Justo L. González (1937- )
Theologian and Church Historian

Quote of the Week

"When people live under oppressive structures, they turn to the Bible for the strength to survive another day, not to figure out how long a day lasted in Genesis 1. The Bible is not read with the intellectual curiosity of solving cosmic mysteries; rather, most people on the margins look to the text to find guidance in dealing with daily life, a life usually marked by struggles and hardships. Debates over the scientific validity of the Scriptures become a luxurious privilege for those who do not endure oppressive and discriminating structures."

Miguel De La Torre, author of Reading the Bible from the Margins and Associate Professor of Social Ethics at Iliff School of Theology

Man created God in his own image . . .

. . . and, in this instance, the Son of God as well.

What is liberation theology?

Tony Campolo offers a helpful answer to that question here:

Tony Campolo
What is Liberation Theology?

With all the upset over Jeremiah Wright and his so-called Liberation Theology, many have been asking what Liberation Theology is all about. Well, it is not very complicated! It is the simple belief that in the struggles of poor and oppressed people against their powerful and rich oppressors, God sides with the oppressed against the oppressors.

Those who adhere to Liberation Theology point out that all through the Bible we find that God always champions the cause of those who are poor and beaten down as they struggle for dignity, freedom and economic justice. When the children of Israel cry out for help as they suffer the agonies of their enslavement under Pharaoh, God hears their cry and joins them in their fight for freedom. God sides with the Jews as they seek deliverance from Egyptian domination.

Read the rest of the article here.

Justo González on Prosperity Theology

"The saddest part of this situation is that such cheap theology turns out to be very expensive. The price we pay for such theology is that we do not dare speak of our sufferings and anxieties, for they are our fault and an indication of our own corruption and lack of faith. The price for such theology is that the poor must internalize their oppression, for they are told that if they are poor it is because of their sin. The price for such theology is a church in which, in contradiction to what is taught in Scripture, the poor, the orphan, and the suffering are shunned, and the rich, the powerful, and the healthy are praised. In short, the price of such theology is abandoning the cross of Christ and its meaning."

Justo L. González (1937- )
Theologian and Church Historian

A Review of Mountains Beyond Mountains

Tracy Kidder, Mountains Beyond Mountains. New York: Random House, 2004.

Mountains Beyond Mountains tells the story of Dr. Paul Farmer, a medical anthropologist and practicing physician whose work in Haiti has made significant inroads in treating tuberculosis and AIDS patients. For those who are interested in learning about the day-to-day realities of healthcare faced by Haitians and others living in underdeveloped countries, this book is an excellent introduction to the issues at hand. While Farmer is not a missionary, his work has been significantly shaped by the best of liberation theology and international development theory. To understand Farmer’s work is to gain insight into many of the issues that missionaries must struggle with as they seek to minister effectively in cross-cultural and poverty-stricken contexts. I highly recommend this book. But beware! Once you pick it up, you won’t be able to put it back down until you’ve finished it.

A detailed review of this book is available here.

Liberating Jonah

Ethics Daily has just run an article on Miguel De La Torre's latest book Liberating Jonah: Forming an Ethic of Reconciliation.

New Book Examines Jonah Story from the Underside of Oppression

Bob Allen
11-01-07

The Old Testament story of Jonah is more than a fairy tale about a man being swallowed by a whale, and even more than an evangelical call to preach the gospel to those in foreign lands, but instead a model for reconciliation between the haves and the have-nots, says a new book.

In Liberating Jonah: Forming an Ethic of Reconciliation, EthicsDaily.com columnist Miguel De La Torre suggests that the reading of Jonah he learned in Sunday school--that God is calling America, as the most powerful nation in the world, to carry the light to those in darkness--is upside down.

The power in the Book of Jonah is the Assyrian Empire, brutal conquerors of the Israelites whom Jonah and his contemporaries likely viewed with hatred and scorn. Reading the text from the perspective of the disenfranchised, De La Torre says the United States is not the hero but the villain.

Click here for the rest of this article.

A Review of Doing Christian Ethics from the Margins

Miguel A. De La Torre, Doing Christian Ethics from the Margins. Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2004. xvi + 280 pp. Paperback, $20.00. ISBN 1-57075-551-5.

Written in the same vein as his award-winning Reading the Bible from the Margins (Orbis, 2002), De La Torre's latest book achieves two important objectives. First, it fills a much needed void for instructors looking for an introductory textbook on liberation ethics. Second, it adds to the growing number of Christian voices on the margins that proactively seek to challenge those from the dominant Eurocentric culture in the U.S. to think and act theologically or ethically from the perspective of the disenfranchised. This book is based on an undergraduate course that De La Torre, a Cuban-American professor of religion, taught by the same name at Hope College, a small liberal arts school affiliated with the Reformed Church in America. [Note that De La Torre is currently teaching at Iliff School of Theology in Denver, which is affiliated with the United Methodist Church.]

Doing Christian Ethics is divided into four parts. In part I (chpts. 1-3), De La Torre outlines his understanding of ethical theory, the major contours of which will be recognizable to those already familiar with liberation theology. Beginning with the premise that ethics is done from a particular social location, he points out that educated white males have traditionally dominated ethical discourse in academia. Consequently, their scholarship is not value neutral but reflects their position of privilege and power in society. Common pitfalls that characterize both historic and contemporary Eurocentric ethics include, amongst other things, the ethical dualism that emphasizes (1) spiritual concerns to the exclusion of social concerns, (2) individualism to the neglect of koinonia, (3) grace in favor of works, (4) heaven instead of the here and now, and (5) failure to generate life- and society-transforming praxis. Consciously or unconsciously, ethics done from a position of privilege only serves to reinforce ideologies of power that perpetuate unjust social structures such as racism, classism, and sexism. Because such ethics thwart Christ's mission "that they (the marginalized) may have life, and have it abundantly" (John 10:10), De La Torre challenges his readers to embrace a system of ethics that is consistent with Christ's example of identifying and standing in solidarity with the oppressed.

For De La Torre, the starting point for doing such ethics is reflection on lo cotidiano or the everyday life experiences of the disenfranchised. On this point, De La Torre makes a significant yet welcome departure from typical liberation theologies. Even though he has elsewhere established his identity as a Latino theologian, he deliberately chooses not to limit his ethical reflection to the life experiences of U.S. Hispanics. Instead, he attempts to construct an inclusive approach to ethics that encourages marginalized groups to work together in their common struggle for justice while refusing to allow them to be pitted against each other by dominant culture. One significant omission is that De La Torre draws primarily from the work of liberation ethicists while ignoring the ethical reflections of disenfranchised evangelicals—a sizably larger group from the margins. While this is a perennial oversight of liberation theology in general, exclusion of such a large constituency compromises De La Torre's claim that his ethics are fully grounded in the experiences of the marginalized.

Part I concludes with an outline of De La Torre's own five-step version of the hermeneutic circle, an important tool which moves the reader beyond simply questioning the ethical discourse of the dominant culture or analyzing the social conditions of the disenfranchised. Rather, it encourages the reader to engage in society-transforming praxis. For the reader from the dominant culture, such praxis is not about exchanging social locations with the marginalized but completely leveling and dismantling racist, sexist, and classist power structures. By doing so, the reader moves beyond mere belief, which is inadequate for salvation in and of itself (Jas. 2:19), and embraces the deeds of faith (Jas. 2:17) that are required to work out his or her salvation with "fear and trembling" (Phil. 2:12).

Parts II, III, and IV give the reader an opportunity to apply the hermeneutic circle to a variety of ethical case studies under the broad categories of global relationships, national relationships, and business relationships. Each section is four chapters in length, with the first chapter of each giving an overview of the topic and the remaining three chapters offering a series of case studies under specific subtopics. De La Torre's case studies differ from those in traditional textbooks in that they are not canned stories designed to elicit a theoretically "correct" answer to an abstract question (e.g., Is killing ever justified?) Instead, they are real-life stories, grounded in the experiences of marginalized people, which seek to move the reader beyond "spectator-type" ethics into society-transforming praxis. Only the first three steps of the hermeneutic circle are covered in each case study. They are followed with a series of discussion questions designed to help the reader arrive at a strategy for praxis by reflecting on the remaining hermeneutical steps through the worldview of the marginalized. For the most part, this is an effective pedagogical tool. But since many prospective readers may have little experience at viewing the world through the eyes of the disenfranchised, it would have been helpful if De La Torre had given two or three case studies where he shows how they have been resolved in his own classroom.

De La Torre's choice of case studies is interesting as it demonstrates how even something as simple as deciding what topics are worthy of ethical reflection is determined by one's social location. Not surprisingly, topics such as genetic technologies and human cloning—standard fare in most contemporary ethics textbooks—are omitted as they are issues far removed from the everyday experience of the disenfranchised. In contrast, De La Torre includes an entire section on business ethics, focusing on topics such as corporate accountability, affirmative action, and private property—concerns that directly impact the marginalized yet rarely, if ever, are addressed in mainstream Christian ethics texts. Most telling—perhaps a reflection of De La Torre's own social location as a middle-class male—is the conspicuous absence of case studies on topics such as prostitution, domestic abuse, abortion, and birth control—all of which are crucial for women on the margins. Nevertheless, De La Torre has succeeded in providing sufficient methodological background that creative instructors will find this book to be a good starting point for considering ethics from the margins in their own classes as well as writing additional case studies that consider the life experiences of marginalized people from other social locations.

De La Torre makes a compelling theological case that those from the dominant culture find their salvation by giving up their power and privilege so that those on the margins can live the abundant life. More importantly, he provides the necessary ethical tools for committed readers to engage in society-transforming praxis. Even so, this is a message that many in the dominant culture will find difficult to accept. And while some might readily give their theological and mental assent to the truth of his words, the real question is how many of us will actually engage in the praxis that De La Torre's method calls for.

This review originally appeared in the Denver Journal.

Is Liberation Theology Dead?

The feminist theologian Rosemary Radford Ruether attempts to answer precisely this question in an article that she wrote two years ago for the National Catholic Reporter.

She begins by noting the declining interest in Latin American liberation theologies on the part of U.S. graduate theological schools:

Five years ago I offered a course in Latin American liberation theology at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, Calif. We studied this theology in the context of the history of church and society in Latin America from the time of the Spanish conquest, focusing on the developments of the 1960s and new stages of Latin American liberation theology in the 1990s to 2000. I was astonished to be told by several students that Latin American liberation theology had been declared to be "dead" or "over with" by some professors at the school. Since that time I have heard several such announcements of the death of liberation theology from students and faculty. It is also evident that few North American theological seminaries are offering courses on Latin American liberation theology today. What is going on?

Contrary to the prevailing opinion amongst many American theologians, Ruether explains that the situation on the ground in Latin America and the Caribbean is actually much different, noting that liberation theology has been most recently characterized by diversification rather than decline.

What has happened to Latin American liberation theology in the last 15 years is not that it has dried up, but rather that it has greatly diversified. It was rightly criticized for being too narrowly focused on class and economic hierarchies and neglecting other dimensions of social relations, such as race, ethnicity and gender. In the last two decades this has been rectified by a great flowering of Latin American feminist theology, all of which sees itself as rooted in liberation theology but expanding through the new recognition of gender hierarchies. Likewise there has been since 1992 a flowering of indigenous theologies, or teologia india, with many encuentros (meetings) across Latin America, especially in the Andean region.

African Caribbean and African Brazilian people are also developing distinct articulations of liberation and feminist theologies in these cultural contexts. There is a burgeoning interest in dialogue between Christianity and indigenous and African-Latino religions: Clara Luz Ajo in Cuba is among those pursuing this kind of reflection in relation to Africa Cuban religions, such as Santeria. Issues of ecology have also attracted theological interest both from theologians such as Leonardo Boff and those who take ecofeminism as their method of theological reflection such as Ivone Gebara in Brazil and the Conspirando network in Chile.

That being said, Ruether goes on to suggest that proclamations that liberation theology is "dead" are premature and reflect the increasing insularity of American culture and academics.

Far from being over with, liberation theology lives in the faith of that sector of Latin American ecumenical Christianity, in Catholics and Protestants who work together both in seminaries and at the grass roots from the perspective of hope for greater justice. The pronouncements that Latin American liberation theology is dead are not only premature, but I think are another indication of the growing parochialism and insularity of the U.S. North American consciousness in the face of a world that is increasingly critical of our way of life.

Ruether's assessment of the state of liberation theology probably comes as no surprise to many of us residing in the Caribbean and Latin America. More importantly, it serves as a reminder to persevere in the task of creatively articulating a theology that is both faithful to scripture as well as the sociocultural context within which we live, worship, and seek to minister.

Click here to read the entire article.

More than Just God the Father: The Trinity as a Divine Model for Human Social Equality

Yesterday, I posted a quote by the African American theologian James Evans that challenges us to recognize how the very nature and character of God is often misrepresented theologically in order to justify racism, classism, sexism, neo-colonialism and many of the other –isms that plague our fallen world. With this in mind, it should be no surprise that theologians representing a variety of historically oppressed groups have attempted to construct theological alternatives to the prevailing racist, classist, sexist, and neo-colonialist images of God that have been propagated by the dominant culture.

The African-American theologian James Cone argues that, in the context of white racist America, “God is Black.” In a similar vein, Gustavo Gutiérrez, a theologian and parish priest from the slums of Lima, Peru, has made the claim that God exercises “a preferential option for the poor.” Numerous feminist theologians have argued that we should image God as both Mother and Father. And finally, the late Caribbean theologian Idris Hamid, in describing the legacy of colonialism and Christianity here in our own region of the world, notes that “we were trained to worship God through somebody else’s experience . . . God is really foreign to us.”

All of these observations lead me to raise the question: Is there an alternative approach to understanding God that allows us to get past images of God that are used to perpetuate sexism, racism, classism, colonialism, and any other –ism that plagues our sinful world? The short answer to that question is “yes” and the alternative that I wish to consider is the ancient doctrine of the Trinity.

Let me explain:

Most Christians are all familiar with the idea that there is one God and only one God as is evidenced in scripture verses such as Deuteronomy 6:4 which declares, “The LORD our God is one LORD” (italics mine). Yet, at the same time we are also familiar with the notion that God is really three distinct persons as evidenced by the use of Trinitarian formulae such as Matthew 28:19-20 where we are taught to baptize new believers “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

For this reason, Christian theology teaches us that we believe in one God in three persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Not surprisingly, the seeming contradiction between God’s oneness and threeness has been the source of lively theological debate throughout much of Christian history. For purposes of this discussion, however, I am not going to attempt to offer a theological explanation of the mystery of the Trinity. Instead, I will take the position of the Tanzanian Roman Catholic bishop Christopher Mwoleka who once argued that the Trinity is not a puzzle to be solved but, rather, an example to be imitated.

So what precisely is it about the Trinity that we should be imitating anyway?

Since the eight century, Eastern Orthodox Christians have understood the Trinity in terms of the Greek word perichoresis (per-ee-kor-eesus), which means “being in one another” and from which the verb form literally translates as “to dance around.” The feminist theologian Anne Clifford suggests that if these two meanings are combined, then “we can imagine the Trinity as three persons engaged in a circular dance, circling and encircling one another with unending energy.” By using such a metaphor to explain the Trinity, we are able to image God as three distinct persons that exist in perfect unity and harmony.

The neo-orthodox theologian Daniel Migloire approaches this concept somewhat differently by suggesting that the Trinity is essentially a koinonia—that is a fellowship or community—of three persons in love. He notes that the persons of the Trinity are not isolated and independent selves but have their personal identity in relationship with each other. This is in contrast to sinful human attitudes and practices that rest on fear or hatred of the other and seek to remove or conquer the other. Instead, the Trinity generates and includes otherness in the inner dynamism of the divine life. Such a Trinitarian concept of God, argues Migloire, can provide a new depth and direction to our understanding of the interdependence of human life and renew our commitment to the struggles for justice and freedom for all people.

And finally, Bishop Mwoleka (as quoted by Justo González) explains that, “The three Divine Persons share everything in such a way that there are not three gods but only one God. And in the same way that the three persons of the Godhead are one, Christ’s wish is: ‘That they (his followers) may be one as we are one. With me in them and you in me, may they be completely one . . .’”

As these theologians have so eloquently suggested, the essence of the Trinity is a life of unity and harmony, a life of fellowship and community, and a life of sharing. Therefore, those of us who profess belief in this Triune God must seek to follow his example.

On one level, this means that we need to work to achieve equality for all people in both our churches as well as society at large by breaking down the barriers of prejudice and discrimination against women, people of other races and nationalities, persons of low social status, and anyone else who finds themselves to be disadvantaged in our society. On another level, this means that within the context of our own churches we need to foster Christian unity and give up the backstabbing, rumor mongering, petty arguments, and personal rivalries that plague so many of our congregations.

But is it really possible for us as human beings to follow the example of our Triune God and live in perfect unity and harmony. The book of Revelation (verse 7:9) teaches us that one day we will stand before the throne of our Triune God and worship him together alongside a countless multitude of others representing every nation, tribe, people, and language. But the book of Revelation doesn’t just give us a glimpse of the future; it also gives us a vision of what the body of Christ can be here on earth right now. For this reason, Jesus himself prayed to the Father (in John 17:23) that we—his followers—would be brought to complete unity to let the world know that God sent his only Son to die for our sins and that he loves us in the same way that he loves his only begotten son.

I believe that we as human beings can find unity and harmony amongst ourselves because our God is more than just God the Father. Our God is . . .

Holy, Holy, Holy! Lord God Almighty!
God in Three Persons, blessed Trinity!

Quote of the Week

"Militarism, a debased view of human sexuality, blind consumerism, ideas of racial supremacy, and xenophobia disguised as patriotism are among the contemporary idols that have asserted an indisputable divine mandate."

James H. Evans, Jr., author of We Have Been Believers and Robert K. Davies Professor of Systematic Theology at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School

For what it's worth, Evans' words remind me of the old Bob Dylan song "With God on Our Side."

Quote of the Week

"Actions speak louder than words, and prophetic actions speak louder than prophetic words."

Virgilio Elizondo, author of Galilean Journey and founding director of the Mexican-American Cultural Center

A Review of Three Months with Revelation

Justo L. González, Three Months with Revelation. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2004. 184 pp. Paperback, $11.00. ISBN 0-687-08868-2

Unlike many of the current popular writings on Revelation, this new devotional guide is not just another outline of end-times events. Instead, Justo González--a Cuban American theologian--approaches Revelation in light of the oppressive context of the Roman Empire in which it was written, arguing that it sought to comfort and bring hope to persecuted churches in Asia Minor. Consequently, its primary significance for today is that it serves as a call to obedience amidst hardship and persecution. Though, it is often misread as a message of terror by those who enjoy economic privilege while living in spiritual complacency.

First published as Tres Meses en la Escuela de Patmos (Abingdon, 1997), this translation now makes an important perspective from Latino/a biblical interpretation accessible to English-speaking readers. Having previously authored two other books on Revelation (see here and here) as well as several additional devotional titles in his Three Months series, González is eminently qualified to share his expertise on Revelation in an easy-to-read devotional format that is appropriate for either individual or group study.

Three Months proceeds through the book of Revelation sequentially, dividing the book into thirteen separate weeks that are in turn subdivided into seven daily readings. Each reading offers an analysis of the daily text that is organized according to the inductive approach (see-judge-act) typical of liberation theology. In order to facilitate the book’s use by study groups, the final reading for each week is double in length and includes a section on recommended group activities.

Typical of González’ previous work in biblical interpretation, Three Months’ strength lies in its sensitivity to the context of empire that shaped the life of the early church as well as its ability to draw lessons from that context for today’s churches. This becomes especially apparent by the second week of the study which discusses the seven letters to the churches (Rev. 2-3). Two of these churches—Philadelphia and Laodicea—are at opposite ends of the spiritual and economic continuums. Philadelphia was economically poor and spiritually rich in contrast to Laodicea, which was economically rich and spiritually poor. Noting that this reflects a general tendency for poor, persecuted churches to be faithful to God and wealthy, unpersecuted churches to be unfaithful, González challenges his readers to consider how their own comfort and complacency keeps them from faithfulness and what they might do to more closely follow the example of Philadelphia rather than Laodicea. In subsequent weeks, González develops this emphasis on faithfulness further, showing how it goes beyond mere personal morality to include one’s social responsibility and political commitments as well. Needless to say, such analysis will probably be uncomfortable for readers whose interests are closely aligned with those of today’s empire.

A weakness of Three Months is that, in order to spread the material out evenly over a three month period, the daily studies often use artificially short snippets of text where two or three days worth of reading might more comfortably be combined into one. This results in a pace of study that sometimes creeps along much too slowly, making it difficult for readers to keep the big picture in mind. While such a problem is not unexpected in a devotional guide, it is a nuisance that detracts from an otherwise high quality work.

I normally tend to avoid using devotional guides, finding most to be superficial and unchallenging. But González was different, offering a deep theological analysis of scripture while simultaneously sharing it in a way that can be easily understood and applied. More importantly, his words are a challenge to all Christian believers who wish to heed Revelation’s call to obedience amidst the oppression of empire.

A Review of The Prophet and Power

Bob Corbett has recently written a very lengthy and detailed review of Alex Dupuy's new book on Jean-Bertrand Aristide, titled The Prophet and Power (Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006).

Basically, the book is a survey of Aristide's influence on Haiti and Haitian politics, beginning with his early days as a liberation theology priest in the 1980s until he was ousted from in his most recent presidency in early 2004.

Unlike most of what has been written about Aristide in the English language press during the past twenty years, Corbett argues that Dupuy's analysis tends to avoid an either/or dichotomy, providing a more nuanced interpretation of Aristide's legacy:

Alex Dupuy’s over-arching thesis is quite different. He makes a strong case that this story lacks any blameless good folks. Whether it is Aristide’s person and personality, the activities of his party and supporters, or any one or group of his Haitian opposition or the U.S.-led international community, each and everyone comes in for severe and intelligent criticism. There just isn’t, on Dupuy’s account, a “right” or “good” side in this story for the country of Haiti. It is a terrible tragedy of the repeated history of the fall of one failed state, being replaced by an equally failed state.

During Aristide's tenure as a parish priest, Corbett explains:

The first Aristide is, on Dupuy’s account, an appealing figure, but with a radical contradiction in his person and views. I am impressed and persuaded by Dupuy’s analysis that THIS early Aristide is best understood as a man of contradictory tendencies (italics mine): a reformer with a true passion to bring about reforms consistent with the liberation theology concept of “the preferential option of the poor,” yet as a personal revolutionary and one who sees himself as not only a prophet, but as a leader not responsible to others.

Later upon being elected to the presidency of Haiti, these contradictions in Aristide's personality coupled with Haiti's volatile internal situation proved to be his undoing:

He preached democracy and revved up a great deal of support for this notion, yet he had an almost impossible time acting democratically within Lavalas or as president. He seemed deeply committed to his own vision and one was either with him or against him. The clash was devastating.

More importantly, he preached democracy, seems to have wanted a rule by law, but faced enormous forces against him, many of which were using physical force. Thus the more revolutionary, prophetic Aristide turned to the non-democratic “power of the people” to protect him.

Perhaps what got Aristide in the greatest mess was his advocacy of and refusal to deny the use of Pere Lebrun (fiery necklacing of people with tires). Not only was this a terrifying threat to government officials and opposition people in the bourgeoisie. It was a frightening inconsistency – at times Aristide seemed to be agreeable to working with the opposition and compromising here and there, and at other times he would be talking of how wonderful this tool was. It created strong doubt in the minds of many of the reliability of any alliance with Aristide.

I have long argued that Aristide had a brilliant career as a liberation theology priest who helped to bring about the demise of Haiti's corrupt Duvalier regime, but that he failed dismally as Haiti's first freely elected president. Dupuy's book helps us to understand why. Clearly, The Prophet and Power is a must-read book for anyone interested in understanding the legacy of Jean-Bertrand Aristide as well as the broader issues of why Haiti remains stubbornly ungovernable.