Toward a Post-Maria Puerto Rican Pastoral Theology
by Elieser Valentin
This article takes a first step in building a Puerto Rican pastoral theology from the diaspora by extrapolating from the experiences of a predominantly Puerto Rican Baptist congregation in New York City as it embarked on relief efforts post Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. It heeds Teresa Delgado’s call for the elaboration of an explicit Puerto Rican theology, one that takes seriously the plight and concern of the Puerto Rican pueblo. [1] The current plight of Puerto Ricans (both on the Island and in the diaspora) demands that theological explorations and constructions take place for and on behalf of the Puerto Rican pueblo, both to make sense of the unmerited suffering Puerto Ricans endure, and to engage, critique, and resist the powers that make such suffering possible. Beyond the very necessary care of souls, such a pastoral theology needs also to be inherently political.
Such a political pastoral theological agenda is one that I, as the pastor of the Iglesia Evangélica Bautista, have set out with my congregation, and it is what provided us with a sense of direction and purpose as we mobilized to help the victims of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. The agenda and task of such a theological undertaking requires a clear understanding of the historical contextual realities in which the church and its ministries are situated. What is required, then, is a proper diagnosis of a church’s contextual realities, one that leads churches to exegete their respective locations. At the Iglesia Evangélica Bautista, we pursue our ministry by taking into account the lived experiences of our people and community, a community in which many Puerto Ricans still live. [2] Only by doing this are we able to care for both “bodies and souls” in ways that are meaningful and efficacious. [3]
To understand the causes of unmerited suffering as a function of a Puerto Rican pastoral theology entails first understanding the history and current context of colonialism in the island, for much of the people’s current plight is a direct consequence of the island’s political status, past and present. It is a status that the Puerto Rican people have not chosen, but that has been chosen for us. Since 1898, Puerto Rico has been a colony of the United States. In fact, Puerto Rico remains the oldest colony in the Western hemisphere, and since the arrival of the Europeans in the late sixteenth century, Taino natives (long virtually extinct due to European warfare, enslavement, and diseases) and then Puerto Ricans have not had any political or economic autonomy. The history of Puerto Rico is a story of subjugation and oppression that clearly has had disastrous consequences not only for its political and economic status but also for the psyche of its people.
There are some people on the U.S. mainland, including most of our federal elected representatives, who do not believe that the circumstances of Puerto Rico merit attention. They think that the well-being of Puerto Rico is secured by virtue of its political status as a commonwealth of the United States. But the reality of the situation tells a different story—as the aftermath of Hurricane Maria made all the more clear. Nelson Denis, a former New York State Assemblyman and the best-selling author of War Against All Puerto Ricans, vividly articulates the reality of the Puerto Rican political situation:
After one hundred years of citizenship, the per capita income of Puerto Ricans is roughly $15,200—half that of Mississippi, the poorest state in the union. Yet in the last five years alone, the [US] government raised the retirement age, increased worker contributions, and lowered public pensions and benefits. It also hiked the water rates by 60 percent, raised the gasoline and sales taxes (the latter to 11.5 percent), and allowed electricity rates to skyrocket. In 2013–14 alone, 105 different taxes were raised in Puerto Rico. [4]
As if this were not enough, Denis continues:
After one hundred years of citizenship, Puerto Ricans are prohibited from managing their own economy, negotiating their own trade relations, or setting their own consumer prices. Puerto Rico has been little more than a profit center for the United States: first as a naval coaling station, then as a sugar empire, a cheap labor supply, a tax haven, a captive market, and now as a municipal bond debtor and target for privatization. It is an island of beggars and billionaires: fought over by lawyers, bossed by absentee landlords, and clerked by politicians. [5]
The fact is that Puerto Rico has been a mere piece of property for the United States, gutted of its natural resources for the gain of the United States and never for the benefit of the people who inhabit the land. Even in times of great need, as is evident in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico has received the short end of the stick when it comes to what should rightfully belong to them. When, in 2017 as a result of Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico faced its worse catastrophe since the early 20th century, the United States failed in its efforts to fund recovery efforts properly and to repeal outdated laws that have hampered the economic opportunities and prosperity of the island. Here I refer specifically to the Jones Act, a law that took effect in 1920 in response to fears that German or other foreign enemy ships might invade US territories. The Jones Act called for punitive taxes and fees on foreign vessels bringing goods to the island, thereby passing along these additional costs to Puerto Rican consumers. As Denis has noted in a recent article, Puerto Ricans now pay $6,000 more for the same automobile than one bought on the US mainland. Food costs are nearly double what they are in Florida. And because of this Jones Act, the delivery of goods and recovery assistance in the aftermath of Maria were hampered, causing the further suffering and even deaths of many Puerto Ricans. President Trump called for a ten-day reprieve of the Jones Act, but what was and is needed is a permanent repeal in order to help Puerto Rico recover from the economic crisis that existed long before the added devastation of Maria. Because the sufferings of the Puerto Rican people are political at root, political responses and answers are needed to combat the forces that caused and continue to cause the undeserved suffering of the Puerto Rican people.
As the Iglesia Evangelica Bautista embarked on a mission to help victims of Hurricane Maria, we realized that our efforts, as necessary as they were, would require more sustained reflection, dialogue, and action. We realized that the recovery blunder on the part of the federal government was symptomatic of the much larger issue facing the island—the colonial status of Puerto Rico and the existence of such status because of US economic interests and sheer racism. Charity work alone would not do. To alleviate many of the ills that Puerto Ricans and other oppressed communities endure, we need to become politically engaged. It was important, then, for me as pastor to create an internal understanding among the people of our church that the work of the church involves more than rhetorical pulpit gospel proclamation. A Puerto Rican pastoral theology, and the work of the church, would need to align itself with the type of political theology espoused by Helmut Gollwitzer, who believed that social change was possible only through direct political engagement. [6]
While our church sprang into action to collect necessary items for the well-being of victims of Hurricane Maria, we also organized and led a public forum on the future of Puerto Rico. We invited Nelson Denis and Union Theological Seminary professor Samuel Cruz to make recommendations, and community leaders from the entire city joined the discussion in order to continue dialogue and organizing efforts toward a more just and prosperous future for the island. One recommendation gathered from this forum was that Puerto Ricans unite to buy land and properties in order to avoid the rampant buying that U.S. corporations and billionaires have planned. In addition, it was clear to all that intentional organizing, dialogue, protest and advocacy would be needed in order for the voices of the voiceless be heard loudly and clearly. Yet, a holistic political engagement can and should entail direct involvement in the electoral political process itself. Systemic ills (for the problems related to the status of Puerto Rico are a systemic matter) require change “from the inside” and thus necessitate political representation that will fight against many of the systemic ills that can be alleviated. Therefore, a Puerto Rican pastoral theology, and by consequence the work of the church that takes such theology seriously, should point and lead to thorough political engagement as Gollwitzer has suggested. The people of Puerto Rico, both in the island and in the diaspora, deserve no less.
At the Iglesia Evangelica Bautista, we have begun an intentional project of educating community members regarding the importance of evaluating the work of elected representatives and of mobilizing efforts that will assure that the work of justice be done on behalf of those who need it most.
[1] In her latest work, Teresa Delgado calls for the development of an explicit Puerto Rican “decolonial” theological project. To my understanding, it is the first work of such nature in published form within the U.S. See A Puerto Rican Decolonial Theology: Prophesy Freedom (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017).
[2] I say “still,” since the Lower East Side of Manhattan, which was a bastion of Puerto Rican representation, has gone through significant demographic shifts as a result of rampant gentrification. Thousands of Puerto Rican families on the Lower East Side have been displaced over the last fifteen years. Please see the following comparative Census data: https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?src=CF; https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?src=CF
[3] The description of the church’s role as saving bodies and souls was used by the late James Cone. I first heard him use the term in a seminar I took with him during my student years at Union Theological Seminary in New York.
[4] https://www.thenation.com/article/after-a-century-of-american-citizenship-puerto-ricans-have-little-to-show-for-it/
[5] ibid.
[6] For an elaboration of the political theology of Helmut Gollwitzer, see the excellent treatment provided by W. Travis McMaken in his latest work, Our God Loves Justice: An Introduction to Helmut Gollwitzer (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2017).
