English: Iglesia del Pueblo Reflection.
Learn as we Lead: Building the Beloved Community.
I appreciate seeing communism presented as the idea of the poor and marginalized faithfully pooling together resources to sustain the work of spreading the gospel or as we would better know it today, as organizing, during the early church. It is a framework that I did begin understanding until learning liberation theology a few years ago.
As a kid, up until I moved to the US, where immigrants hoping to become legalized can easily be denied citizenship if they have been part of the communist party and the old Communist Control Act revival became a dog whistle for the conservative party, I never associated the words communism with very very bad people as trump would say…
I grew up in a barrio with large murals to Che Guevara, and a family with a remarkable contribution to the struggles, which is what Arelis asked me to speak on today. My great uncle was chairman of the Communist Party in Uruguay before I was born and although we have never met, I consider him a precious ancestor and enjoy reading his work. He famously said that Cuba was a change in the emancipatory struggle of our Latin American peoples, because it marked the beginning of the second and final independence and even had the opportunity to meet Fidel in Havana back in the day. In his writings Communism and democracy in the Latin American Cold War: the case of the PC of Uruguay in the 1960 Jaime Yaffé writes in the Revista Brasileira de História a long analysis and in the midst, I was given a gift, the ability to learn of a vision that my great uncle had in 1970 that I see realized more and more in our movement today, let me read you an excerpt and leave an encouraging thought:
In 1970 Rodney Arismendi produced a series of theoretical-political essays centered on the problem of the ways of the revolution in Latin America, based on a review of this issue in Lenin’s thought. In 1970 these texts were reunited and published in a book titled Lenin, the revolution and Latin America (Lenin, la revolución y América Latina). After an extensive development of Lenin’s ideas he stated that the road of violence was opened “in the circumstance that the legal ways of struggle were closed” (Arismendi, 1970, p. 480).
When they were in force, democracy and liberty were a desirable context for the development of the peaceful transition to socialism. But this perspective seemed unlikely in the vast majority of Latin American countries in the 1960s. These essays were produced and published at the moment when Chilean and Uruguayan Communists, amidst rumors of military coups and/ or foreign invasions, were embarking themselves in leftist coalitions oriented to the peaceful way of revolution as a strategic alternative.
(Arismendi, 1970, pp. 331–332). (1)
Hardly controversial or scary words. In fact, I find them wise and aligned with our non violent approach. Yet as the new drums of wars and red scares beat in the distance, we must stand firm in our ranks as part of what Dr. King called the non violent army. Continuously calling for peaceful outcomes, cease fires, demilitarization and most of all LOVE. The work being done by Nati, Dorlimar, Tim and everyone here should serve us as inspiration to keep going this week and our own involvement should also inspire us to see that we literally are our ancestors’ wildest dreams realized and that it is no chance or fortune that we are here together.
