Luther and Liberation: A Latin American Perspective

Church is generated and determined by the word of God. Without it, the community would only be a community, but not a Christian and holy community; people, but not the people of God. Without the word, the Church would be nothing, although it had the most flamboyant temples, the most functional organization, and the most dynamic activity. On the other hand, according to Luther, where the word of God is, there is the Church, even though the community may be small and weak. 2. Distinctions Luther wanted the gospel to reform and renew the Church. Never, however, did he intend to form the perfect Church. 2.1 The Internal Church and the External Church In truth he never wanted to leave the Catholic Church, despite the misrepresentation he detected in it, and, despite having been kicked out of it, he understood himself until the end of his life not as the founder of a denominational church itself, but simply as the pastor of the universal Church of Christ, in the local church of Wittenberg. In the first place, I ask that men make no reference to my name; let them call themselves Christians, not Lutherans. What is Luther? After all, the teaching is not mine. Neither was I crucified for anyone. St. Paul, in I Corinthians 3, would not allow the Christians to call themselves Pauline or Petrine, but Christian. How then should I . . . come to have men call the children of God by my wretched name? Not so, my dear friends; let us abolish all party names and call ourselves Christians, after him whose teaching we hold . . . I neither am nor want to be anyone’s master. I hold, together with the universal church, the one universal teaching of Christ, who is our only master.19 However, it was impossible to escape the unfortunate historical 19. LW 45:70–71. Luther and Liberation 130 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

contingency of the formation of a Lutheran church and other denominational churches. One is only Lutheran, however, if one is ecumenical. And one who is not, abuses the name of Luther. Although determined to have, through the free course of the gospel, a better church, more faithful to Christ, Luther would not allow any sectarianism to dominate that tries to separate the saints and saved from the impure and condemned. To obtain both, Church reform but without falling into sectarianism, he distinguished between the internal Church and the external church, the Church as the creature of the word and the church as a human organization, the Church believed and the church manifested. These dimensions are always given simultaneously, not as compartmentalized entities. Just as the believer is at the same time righteous and sinful, so too the Church is simultaneously righteous and sinful, righteous through the word that constitutes it, and sinner through the perversion of God’s will that is imposed on it by those who comprise it, justified but sinners. Whoever wants to ensure the purity of the Church through institutional measures, through the selection and the congregation of those people who are already just, transforms it inevitably and immediately into a false church. The task of the true Church is not a work to be finished but a fight in permanent progress. It is a struggle, at the level of the Church, of the word of Christ and his kingdom against the reality of evil implanted also in the Church and in its organization. The solution to this conflict will not happen in time, but in its consummation, when the full reality of the kingdom of God renders the Church itself superfluous. Until then we will always have the external church as an imperfect expression of the internal Church, which is simultaneously the constitutive element and the critical measure of it. The Church—Poor People of God 131 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2.2 The Visibility and Invisibility of the Church There are passages in which Luther strongly highlights the invisibility of the Church. He notes that the Church is confessed (Article 3 of the Apostles’ Creed) and that, therefore, it is invisible. Because what is seen, is not believed. Again one can observe the distinction between the internal and external Church, as well as the Luther’s strong institutional critique: For what is believed is neither physical nor visible. All of us can see the external Roman church. That is why it cannot be the true church, which is believed and which is a community or assembly of the saints in faith. But no one can see who is holy or who believes.20 There were occasions—and obviously there still are—in which the meaning of the concept of the invisibility of the Church was extrapolated and perverted. Thus, nineteenth century Lutheran theologies strongly emphasized the invisibility of the Church, precisely to leave the external institution of the bourgeois and statist church untouched. That is, the concept of the invisibility of the Church in all its critical dimension was castrated. So, it is important to rescue it, de-absolutizing the concept of “invisibility” itself. For this concept was absolutely no longer that of Luther. He used it to describe the deep nature of the Church, but not to spiritualize it or stabilize it. Note that Luther also could talk about the signs of the Church. There is no fixed relationship between these signs. One can summarize them all in the word of God. Where this is encountered and active, there is the Church. However, Luther also presented relatively extensive lists of the signs of the Church, in which the word is complemented by the sacraments, ministries, prayer and—not least—the experience of suffering and the cross.21 20. LW 39:75. Luther and Liberation 132 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

All these signs are manifestations and embodiments of the word, and as such are also visible characteristics of the Church. What remains invisible is its deep qualification and size, its ultimate nature. Therefore, Luther may have also preferred, in place of the term “invisible,” the expression “hidden.”22 In the signs, the Church is hidden, but effective and concretely present. One can observe that the signs are small and weak, corresponding to the nature of revelation and salvation of God itself. Thus as the power of God is hidden in the cross of Christ, although revealed through faith and acting effectively, so the Church of God is made present and active in weak and thus implausible signs of the word, the sacraments, prayer, and the cross. 2.3 The Church, a Hospital The dimension of weakness, and thus fraternity and solidarity, was very present in Luther. His admonition was frequent in the sense that the community must realize love for the needy and sustain the unprotected. In a masterly exposition of the ecclesiological chapter of Paul in 1 Cor. 12,23 Luther develops the mutual responsibility of the members of a body, in the case of the Christian community, the body of Christ. Luther expands Paul’s figure of the body with its many members and the attention that is due to them, in particular to the weak members. For him this is a characteristic and essential feature of the Christian community. In his genius, Luther illustrates the question with the simple example of someone who hits his little toe on some obstacle (say, a corner table or a stone). What happens when one feels the pain? The mouth cries out in pain, the face tightens, the body bends down toward the injured toe, the hand gropes, the 21. LW 41:164–65. 22. WA 7, 722, 5 and 8. 23. LW 35:52. The Church—Poor People of God 133 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

eyes check what happened, that is: the entire human body worries and concerns itself with the lowest members who are suffering. So it is (or should be) in the community as the body of Christ. When the least of the members suffer, all suffer with her and take care of her. It is thus, in precariousness and in love, that the Church is an instrument to combat evil. It does not posit being the kingdom of God but it can be at its service. This life, then, is a life of being healed from sin, it is not a life of sinlessness, with the cure completed and perfect health attained. The church is the inn and the infirmary, for those who are sick and in need of being made well. But heaven is the palace of the healthy and the righteous.24 The Church as a sanatorium: the earthly palaces belong to the powerful who know nothing of love and of the cross of Christ; the Church of Christ does not wander their halls. Let us conclude this section with one of Luther’s hymns (Ach Gott, vom Himmel sieh darein), which expresses much better all that I have been trying to say here: Ah God, from heaven look down and view; Let it thy pity waken; Behold thy saints how very few! We wretches are forsaken. Thy word they will not grant it right, And faith is thus extinguished quite Amongst the sons of Adam. They teaching a cunning false and fine, In their own wits they found it; Their heart in one doth not combine, Upon God’s word well grounded. One chooses this, the other that; Endless division they are at, And yet they keep smooth faces. 24. LW 25:262–63. Luther and Liberation 134 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Therefore said God: “I must be up; My poor ones ill are faring; Their signs crowd up to Zion’s top, My ear their cry is hearing. My healing word shall speedily With comfort fill them, fresh and free, And strength be to the needy.” Silver that seven times is tried With fire, is found the purer; God’s word the same test will abide, It still comes out the surer. It shall by crosses proved be; Men shall its strength and glory see Shine strong upon the nations.25 III. Luther’s Ecclesiology and the Churches in Latin America Here we examine the prophetic and reconciling dimensions of the Church, the constitution of the territorial churches, and the challenge of the BECs. 1. The Prophetic and Reconciling Dimensions of the Church I develop this point from the story of an episode highly significant to me that moved me deeply. In 1983, five hundred years after the birth of Luther, I offered a lecture on this theme in Buenos Aires. Argentina was so traumatized, not only by the recent defeat in the Malvinas War against England, but especially by the crimes committed by the military dictatorship that rose to the surface more and more. The deep wound of thousands of disappeared, a good number of them nominally known and friends of those in the audience, was evidently painful. Many more had been brutally tortured in secret prisons, on behalf of the order. Many were thrown 25. LW 53:226–28. The Lutheran Book of Worship (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1978) does not include this hymn. The Church—Poor People of God 135 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

from airplanes into the sea. It was discussed intensely what a democratic regime, succeeding the military dictatorship, should do with those people who had committed such heinous crimes. In the discussion that followed the lecture, I was asked whether, according to Luther, the Church should shelter in her womb torturers too. I responded by referring to the classification of the Church as a hospital, on the part of Luther, to conclude that yes, in principle, the Church should be open to also host torturers. However, one needs to determine if these torturers would be looking to the Church as a hospital, in which they would be submitted to treatment to be cured of their serious illness, or if they would look to the church for refuge to cover up their crimes or, even, as a cloak to continue committing them—not just in the name of the order, but even in the name of God. That would be nothing less than blasphemy. The answer obviously was not a solution to the problem but I believe it was apt to return the question to the listening Argentinians themselves, for their reflection with a new standard. The intense silence with which my response was received gave me the feeling that the reflection of the public re-started right there. Subsequently, the political response adopted in Argentina, after a number of years and a temporary punishment for the military commanders responsible for the Malvinas War, was amnesty. In fact, amnesty is often an effective political instrument to pacify a nation. Can it, however, apply to crimes against human dignity? Anyway, there were no signs that the torturers were willing to have a true “hospital” treatment, in the sense of Luther. On the contrary, one heard with enough frequency the claim that the “dirty war” had been a necessity to preserve the homeland. Fortunately, Argentina moved in the direction of revoking this unjust law of amnesty and in the meantime the authorities responsible for torture and disappearances, Luther and Liberation 136 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

including the presidential level, were convicted and serve prison sentences. The same was seen in Brazil, although with perhaps less spectacular numbers. Here, at once, amnesty was applied, without distinction, to the exiles and participants of the military regime, within the context of the so-called “slow, gradual and safe transition” from the military dictatorship to a democratic regime, employing the expression used by President General Ernesto Geisel. One could see, then, not only the clear signs of the “non-treatment of the sick,” but also that the perpetrators of these crimes continued working effectively behind the scenes in the same spirit with which the crimes of the repression were committed. Let us look at the following example, sadly symptomatic. In 1968, João Paulo Burnier, chief of staff of the Air Force Minister, Mércio de Souza Mello, formed the troop of Para-Sar and demanded that it practice State terrorism. It planned the explosion of the Gasômetro, a center for gas piped in from Rio de Janeiro, next to a bus station, a place of an intense movement of people. The communists would be blamed, to give the pretext for a coup by the military hardliners. The plan was aborted in June, because the captain of the Air Force Sérgio Ribeiro Miranda de Carvalho, Sérgio Macaco (monkey), courageously refused to execute it. In retaliation, he was arrested and expelled from Para-Sar and, when the fateful Institutional Act 5 (AI-5) was imposed in December of that year, he was deposed of his political rights. Later, he came to be acquitted by the Supreme Military Court, but he was never reinstated in the Air Force. Under the democratic regime, in 1992, the Supreme Court reestablished the rights of the captain and commanded the Air Force to promote him to brigadier. The Minister of the Air Force, brigadier Lélio Lobo, however, ignored the supreme court decision twice, finally referring the matter to the President of the Republic Itamar Franco, commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces. He, however, The Church—Poor People of God 137 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

left the matter without making a decision, until the persecuted and wronged captain died from cancer, on the 4th of February 1994, at sixty-three years of age, without seeing his rights restored.26 Still today (2015) it has not been possible in Brazil to revoke the amnesty law, in the form in which it was approved by Congress under pressure of the military dictatorship still in charge (1979). Sadly, it was even endorsed in 2010 by the Supreme Court in the democratic regime that succeeded it. Thus, the National Truth Commission, established only in 2012, has exercised their work, without being able to refer criminal cases, but with the still important task of revealing to the Nation the truth of the crimes committed, still denied by military representatives, despite evidence and proof. Returning to Luther, we observe that he never cheapened the word of God. He always understood the dialectic of the law and gospel, according to which grace always presupposes the charge of sin. Indeed, the capacity to distinguish between the law and the gospel was for him classified as the touchstone to verify the theological suitability of any Christian.27 Thus, also the Church cannot exercise its reconciling task, except in combination with its prophetic task. 2. The Constitution of the Territorial Churches An obvious problem when searching for the current relevance of 26. See Luiz Cláudio Cunha, “Que Vergonha, Presidente Itamar!,” Zero Hora, XXX(10.400): 13, 9/2/94: “Brazil is a land that mistreats the few heroes that it has. Threatened by the attorney general of the Republic with being subject to criminal liability, for breach of a court order, President Itamar Franco promoted Captain Sérgio postmortem, on the 11th February, 1994, with the proviso, however, of further appeal on the grounds that no one in the military is guaranteed beforehand promotions that lead to the highest level.” [Translation by T. Cooper.] 27. On the distinction between law and gospel see Hans Joachim Iwand, Glaubensgerechtigkeit nach Luthers Lehre, 2nd ed. (Munich: Chr. Kaiser, 1951), 27–43; Gerhard Ebeling, Luther: An Introduction to his Thought, trans. R. A. Wilson (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1970), 110–24; and Hans Schwarz and Robert Jenson, “The Means of Grace,” in Christian Dogmatics, vol. 2, ed. Carl Braaten and Robert Jensen (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1984), 269–74. Luther and Liberation 138 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Luther’s ecclesiology is the constitution of the territorial or even statist Lutheran Churches. How does one understand this phenomenon, which seems to contradict the basic ecclesiological premises of the Reformer? Luther specified and gave great value to the political task, attributing it, in a historical perception with all probability correct at that moment, mainly to the princes. Very soon, however, territorial churches linked to the authority of the princes were organized. Luther understood this as an emergency measure for the organization of the Church in a situation of conflict and with the lack of mature communities and prepared pastors. The measure became definitive and fell within the political framework of strengthening the State and the new political authorities. There emerged, in parallel, Protestant and Catholic territories, according to the faith of their respective princes. Among them there were certainly riots, clashes, division, and even wars. Finally, an agreement of co-existence arrived, in 1555, with the Religious Peace of Augsburg. The principle that emerged was one of cuius region eius religio, according to which the religious-confessional affiliation of the subjects depended on the religious choice of the prince who exercised power in that territory. In an expression of incipient religious freedom, it was established for the first time that people in disagreement with the option of the respective prince could migrate to a neighboring territory, whose prince had opted for the other confession of faith. However, such migration was obviously not always feasible, so people remained subjected to the choice of the prince. Thus the territorial churches were created, which obviously were not conducive to the development of an autonomous faith or to the responsible exercise of the universal priesthood of believers. On the contrary, with the development of political absolutism, the churches The Church—Poor People of God 139 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

were more and more domesticated and integrated into the statist political systems. Without doubt, this historical development contributed greatly to the fact that the Lutheran churches have frequently been markedly conservative.28 In other words—and this is important to realize—its conservatism was due to historical political developments, not fundamental theological options. The politically feasible “solution” of territorial churches is also problematic in other ways, not only for having led to a political and ecclesial conservatism. It is true that we cannot retroactively project our actual reality of organized society with religious pluralism to the situation experienced in Luther’s time. The idea that the stability of a social organization also depended on unity in the confession of faith was widely accepted. This is precisely what is meant by a model of “Christendom.” The simple co-existence, in principle peaceful, among social organizations with different religious choices, even if only in contiguous territories, was almost impossible to conceive of and accept, and required a legal and political engineering hard to imagine from a distance today. The process that led to the regulation of the religious question was extremely painful, even after the Peace of Augsburg (1555) and, in a sense, it is understood that this has been disrespected quite often, even after taking into account the bloody Thirty Years War (1618-1648). Only the Peace of Westphalia (1648) came to regulate definitively, in legal parity terms, the coexistence of Catholicism and Protestantism. Therefore, in such a context and with the premises at his disposal, Luther did not break with the conception of Christendom and did not advocate in favor of a religiously pluralistic society or observe religious freedom in modern terms. He sadly even turned against the 28. Fortunately, there are significant examples to the contrary, such as the Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who through his theological conviction became involved in the resistance to National Socialism, was arrested in 1942 and executed by the regime in April 1945, one month before the end of the Second World War. Luther and Liberation 140 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

radical wing of the Reformation, urging the authorities to suppress the Anabaptist movement with violence.29 The most one could say is that his theological concepts of the freedom of conscience of faith (albeit tied to the word of God), of the universal priesthood of believers, and the Church as a community and people of God, among others, contain a tendency to evolve in the direction of tolerance, full religious freedom, and religious pluralism. 3. The Challenge of the BECs Leonardo Boff wrote a book with the intriguing title Ecclesiogenesis and an almost programmatic subtitle: The Base Communities Reinvent the Church. 30 His brother Clodovis Boff spoke of the BECs as creators of “a new type of Christian,” “unparalleled in previous” history.31 It is quite likely that there was an exaggerated enthusiasm in his conclusion but little doubt remains that the emergence and expansion of the BECs represented a highly significant renewal impulse within the churches of the Latin American continent. In this context and in hindsight, we can on the one hand register what was revolutionary in Luther’s ecclesiology; in it we find a communitarian emphasis, the liberation from institutional tutelage, the understanding of the ecclesial structure as reformable and for service, the preference for the weak, the mark of the cross, and primacy of the word of God. 29. In 2010, in the XI General Assembly of the LWF, in Stuttgart, Germany, after years of study and dialogue, they held a historic and poignant act of the confession of sins, asking for forgiveness and reconciliation. In this, the communion of Lutheran churches apologized to God and their Mennonite brothers and sisters for the violent persecution and even executions of Anabaptists during the Reformation, as well as the biased Lutheran interpretations of these events throughout history. The Mennonite representatives, in a gesture of great humanity and Christian love generously granted forgiveness. There followed, finally, a common worship of reconciliation. 30. Leonardo Boff, Ecclesiogenesis: The Base Communities Reinvent the Church, trans. Robert Barr (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1986). 31. Clodovis Boff, “CEBs e Práticas de Libertação,” REB 40, no. 160 (1980): 625. The Church—Poor People of God 141 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

On the other hand, the necessary liberation from dominant political tutelage only happened in assay. As we already pointed out, already in Luther there was, from a certain point, a linkage to secular territorial authority, although Luther saw it as an emergency measure, in the phase of the transition and organization of the Church. However, what for Luther still was emergency, later became a stable institution: the organization of territorial churches linked and subject to the respective princes. Such an evolution had to inevitably lead to the loss of the dimension of solidarity with the weak, and consequently the community submitted itself (or was submitted) again to an ecclesiastical institution, organized from the top down. In exchange for their membership, the believers came to receive the provision of religious services from this institution, whose executive staff were pastors. No wonder that the missionary and diaconal meaning of such a church has remained permanently underdeveloped. We have seen that the Lutheran immigrants, at least in Brazil, were satisfied with being free from their state churches, although in general they preserved the expectation of religious service, through a community with a structure often tied to the dominant local powers, rather than a community in solidarity, of mission, and liberating service. Also in historical Protestantism we detect a passage from a liberating moment to one of consolidation with the existing structures of domination. Finally, also in Pentecostalism we register similar marks of ambiguity. One could thus affirm that the reform of the Church is still pending in a fuller sense. It still needs to pass through a process of “radicalization.” The BECs are an expression of this possibility or attempt. They are a manifestation of an experience of faith, simultaneously turned toward the praise of God and inserted into historical processes in search of liberty, justice, and peace. In what Luther and Liberation 142 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

way did they develop in a liberating sense within the Catholic Church and to what extent were they absorbed and domesticated by the hierarchical institutional structures and their disciplinary bodies? Despite the restrictive measures they have suffered, they have preserved in large part their original vitality. Their development, therefore, suffered not only from outside conflicts but also from tensions internal to the Catholic Church. The rescue of Luther’s ecclesiology can, in this context, play a key role because it establishes, with absolute clarity, the community as an essential ecclesiological dimension and the institutions as ancillary and reformable. In the Protestant perspective, another matter arises, however. To what extent can the experience of the BECs be a reality in the Protestant churches in Latin America? There is an obvious difficulty. While the Catholic Church can count on—all too often uncritically—the reality of the popular Latin American masses being Christian (Catholic), organizing with relative ease a community that combines worship and the historical practice of faith in the concrete experience of the day-to-day, the Protestant churches, minorities in this continent, could be doomed or could form themselves into communities maintained exclusively by denominational affiliation or dissolve into the Catholic BECs, with wide popular range. The difficulty that faces Protestant pastors or pastoral agents who attempt a popular practice is no coincidence, as a general rule. The Catholic Church, as an institution, can maintain more easily a dualist and parallel ministry, divided into sectors, one popular and the other so-called minority (of the middle and upper classes). Protestant communities are rarely characterized by a distinctly popular scope, in which reflection on the reality of life and of the life of faith could lend itself in an immediate way.32 The overwhelming majority of Protestant communities is, on the contrary, minority and multi32. In this regard, many Pentecostal communities have potential not yet explored in its entirety, The Church—Poor People of God 143 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

class when not composed of the middle, and possible upper, classes. Consequently, energies are spent within the churches, in order to strengthen its structural cohesion and to find a raison d’être. The bond of union is, then, through the quintessential celebration of the common faith, not experience and historical practice. Protestant ministry faces an unavoidable consequence that it should place emphasis on the motivation of faith for a historical practice of solidarity with the marginalized and of the insertion into popular organizations and social movements of a liberating nature. This practice also agrees with the traditional Protestant mode of distinguishing and relating faith and politics. Without doubt, it will not be an easy task, since all the tensions that characterize our societies divided between the oppressed and the oppressors are so strongly felt within the community itself, not able to be separated within a majoritarian ecclesial macrostructure, like the Catholic Church in Latin America. However, could there be, despite all the obvious difficulties and risks, also some chance for a better relationship between the ecclesial community and political practice? In the article mentioned above, Clodovis Boff exposes the implications of the changing political landscape of the BECs. For many years, during the military regimes, they played an important political role, in that communities of faith were also the only viable space for the organization of the people as a proposed alternative to the existing system. How do they relate to social practices of liberation, from the historical moment in which they opened other spaces of popular organization, such as neighborhood associations, peasant organizations, and labor unions, even popular political parties? In a situation thus changed, various temptations accosted the BECs: from the fear of ideological infiltration and of political parties despite Pentecostalism’s strong growth and its increasing involvement in public issues. In many places they have an undoubtedly popular scope. Luther and Liberation 144 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

foreign to the communities to the fear of losing control of the popular struggles and claims. The more mature BECs discovered then that there is a space of faith, in which its members are strengthened for action within the popular organizations themselves, outside the walls of the ecclesial community. Many times there can be a close personal and group connection among them, but there is a healthy separation of powers. One can observe a striking parallelism in the role of BECs, predominantly Catholic, in Latin America, under military dictatorships, on the one hand, and predominantly Lutheran groups and communities in the former German Democratic Republic under Stalinist tutelage, on the other, the process that contributed to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. In both cases, the Christian community constituted a highly significant space of freedom; in both cases, there developed at some stage a broad grassroots movement, a minority at first, becoming widely popular, in favor of democracy. In both cases, the question of the identity and the role of the Christian community surfaced anew quite critically under the circumstances of a new situation with democratic freedoms. Obviously there were also differences, most of them concerning a different vision about the form of society longed for: while the communities of Eastern Europe were engulfed by the dream of the alleged wonders of capitalism, the BECs in Latin America came to crave a more fraternal and participative society, characterized by the sharing of resources and political-economic order centered on programs of inclusion and social justice. What tasks remain for the ecclesial community that cannot be delegated because they are unique? Clodovis Boff mentioned the celebration of faith and the education of faith;33 Protestant terminology would speak of worship and Christian education. We 33. Clodovis Boff, 604. The Church—Poor People of God 145 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

would add spreading the faith, that is, proclamation and mission, which Clodovis Boff omitted, probably assuming that all Latin American people were Christian and believers—to be sure, a strange success of the colonial project of Christendom. Worship, Christian education, mission—celebration of the faith, education of the faith, spreading of the faith—configure the ecclesial community, which finds its source of life in the gospel of Jesus Christ and its historical concretization in connection with the practice of the liberation of the poor. Church—poor people of God. Luther and Liberation 146 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:11:34 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

7 Sacraments Tomb or Cradle of Christian Community? Sacramental practice suffers, in a fairly general way, from a strong ambiguity. Quite widespread in Brazilian Lutheranism—and, if I am seeing correctly, in Catholicism too—is an individualist, magical, and uncommitted understanding of the efficacy of the sacraments. It refers to the practice of the sacraments as a holy recourse to divine forces, able to remedy problems and existential angst—even physical illnesses—without resulting in a deepening of faith, strengthening of community, and a commitment to love of the neighbor. I. The Critical Question for the Practice of the Sacraments In the ecclesial celebration of the sacraments, I have experienced, like many other people, ups and downs in the life of faith. Although it is theologically justified that the efficacy of the sacraments, as a means of grace, does not depend on liturgical forms, neither on the integrity of the one officiating,1 much less the intensity of the sensations evoked, 1. This is the fundamental theological balance of the controversy, in the Early Church, with the Donatists. For them, the efficacy of the sacrament depended on the integrity of the faith (possibly moral) of the priest. The Church recognized, rightly, that to establish this bond would make the grace of God, what is sovereign, free and open, depend on an always dubious quality of a human being. See Bernhard Lohse, A Short History of Christian Doctrine, trans. F. Ernest Stoeffler (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1966), 132–36. One could still object that if the efficacy of the sacrament depended on the quality of the officiant, this would not only be subjected to 147 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

it is indisputable that the function assumed by pastoral practice is related to the meaning perceived by the participating community. That is, the community perceives and gives meaning to sacramental practice, in that its forms denote consistency with its theological definition. But our perception tells us that sacramental practice is in crisis. It does not seem possible to me to overlook something deeply contradictory in most baptismal and Eucharistic celebrations in our ecclesial communities. There is in them something mechanical that symbolically contradicts the proclaimed and transmitted renewal of life and of the lordship of Christ. It is common, for example, for the pastor to meet the parents of a child being baptized only moments before the worship. Even in the most “normal” cases, the community seems to be accustomed to baptisms in series,2 unaware of the challenge and boost that come from each baptismal celebration. The celebration of the Eucharist—commonly known as the “Holy Supper” or “Lord’s Supper” in a Lutheran environment—to which the masses flock on special occasions such as Easter, seems to be even more mechanical. However, even when the turnout is much lower, the concern with facilitating the celebration, so that it moves as quickly as possible, is often dominant. It seems the sacramental celebration has acquired an individualizing characteristic. One is in a hurry to get the sacramental grace, to “go home.” The validity of these sacramental celebrations is not in question. Neither is it advisable to advocate that people abstain from the vigilance of the ecclesial community, as one might suppose, but above all it would acquire a power over the divine, what could be exercised as domination over the (rest of) the people of God. 2. There seems to be, however, a widespread practice to celebrate baptism in the regular worship of the community, and not in a special time apart from it, whether in the church, or in the home of the child (or adult) being baptized, as used to occur frequently in the past. This helps to highlight the community aspect of each baptism, with the integration of the child (or adult) being baptized into the community. Luther and Liberation 148 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

participating in them because of problematic aspects of their practice. Rarely does abstention- even for protest- have the power to heal something that may be sick but is vital for the church. On the contrary, abstention tends to transform itself into a principle of selfsufficiency that ends by dispensing with the sacrament itself. From this, it indirectly contributes to leaving the sacramental practice untouched, with all its defects. On the other hand, one must recognize—and thus the ambiguity to which we allude—that in recent decades there have been many attempts to renew sacramental practice in the IECLB including the adoption of a new liturgy with greater emphasis on the sacraments. There is no doubt also that on many of these occasions of alternative celebrations or following a new liturgical orientation—although of course these may also be abused—a deepening significance of the celebrated sacrament has been experienced in a new way. These celebrations invariably emphasize the community aspect—and it is important to realize this aspect. There is something in common among the participants much broader than the mere celebration. There is a living Christian community. Consequently, even as there is concern with the “order,” there is, however, much more effort toward appropriate symbolism than toward technical efficiency. The rush never seems to be dominant. I remember with satisfaction, for example, my pastoral practice in a community of worship, when a young man coming from a Buddhist community was baptized. The deep silence, of an intense intimate reflection, by the community left no doubt that all the people, even those accustomed to monthly baptismal celebrations, felt the impact of baptism in its radical gift and commitment to a new life this time. Or, what deep meaning the Lord’s Supper acquires, when celebrated by a community that has a common effective Christian life, for example, in the defense of the rights of the people, and Sacraments 149 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

exposes before God and the people their successes and failures, through which it asks forgiveness and gives thanks, renewing itself in intercession and service! Obviously, one does not deny here the personal dimension of the sacraments, but Christian people obtain forgiveness and renewal not in isolation, but as members of the Christian community. The examples listed above, and the ambiguity highlighted through them, prefigure our theme: Sacraments—tomb or cradle of the Christian community? How can the same sacrament have such different functions? How does one live the faith when conditions and interests lurk behind every kind of practice? Is it possible to “undermine” one “sepulchral” practice and favor a practice of the “cradle”? What conditions must be given for the former to be avoided and for the latter to become reality? These questions accompany and serve as a guide to the reflection expressed below. II. The Sacraments in the Lutheran Reformation Here we address the Church and sacrament in the Augsburg Confession and liberated sacramental practice and theology. 1. Church and Sacrament in the Augsburg Confession In article seven,3 the Augsburg Confession (AC) inserts the “correct administration of the sacraments” into the definition of the church. The article presents an internal difficulty, in that, while requiring the correct administration of the sacraments, it also declares the issues of “rite or ceremony,” which may legitimately vary, as not belonging to the essence of the Church. This could suggest that the correct 3. “Augsburg Confession,” in The Book of Concord: The Confession of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, ed. Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), 42, 43; hereafter abbreviated as BC. Luther and Liberation 150 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

doctrine of the sacraments would suffice, regardless of the sacramental practice. However, this is not the intention of the AC. Of course, liturgical variability is explicitly and consciously accepted but the correct administration of the sacraments is not only a doctrinal issue. Rather, it also includes practice.4 Furthermore, this article does not declare its “indifference” to ceremonial questions—that would be a misunderstanding; instead, it asserts that for the “unity of the church” “a uniformity of ceremonies” is not required. Implicit, here, is that a question about the “appropriate” or “most appropriate” ceremonies can remain legitimate. In any case, the critical question is indispensable for any misrepresentation of the significance of the sacrament arising from improper sacramental practice. Not every practice is consistent with the “correct administration of the sacraments,” although no practice, however appropriate and meaningful it is, constitutes the rightness of the administration of the sacraments. 2. Liberated Sacramental Practice and Theology Luther repeatedly lamented that most people did not know the meaning of the sacraments. Consequently they acquired false expectations about the sacraments. They believed that something magical happened when attending the sacraments, making the people automatically miraculously protected. People assumed that through the simple reception of the sacraments they would be guaranteed eternal life. Thus, and this was the grave damage they experienced, they would know nothing about the real help provided by the sacraments, much less the commitment they entail. On the other hand, these people became dependent on a church 4. Further on, we mark Luther’s concern in this regard. Sacraments 151 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

that taught them the meaning of the sacraments. The church was the owner and distributor of the power of grace. The faithful became mere recipients of the sacraments, rather than participants in the celebration. Luther saw the ideological rationalization of this practice in the doctrine of ex opere operato, that is, the sacrament would have efficacy by virtue of its execution, independent of the faith of the person who received it. It should be noted at the outset that today this criticism of Luther is no longer valid, in that Catholic theology does not still understand ex opere operato in such a simplistic way. Certainly, this doctrine intends to point to the divine efficacy of the sacrament, which Luther, for his part, did not intend to question in any way. On the other hand, however, also for Vatican II—and not perhaps just for Luther—the sacraments “presuppose faith,” “they also nourish, strengthen and express it,”5 which is certainly an exceptionally beautiful formulation adequate for what Luther aimed to accentuate. 2.1 What Is a Sacrament? In this context, one understands Luther’s denunciation that, through the existing sacramental practice, the Church would be subjected rightly to a true “Babylonian captivity.” A process of liberation was therefore necessary. This is basically derived from the proclamation of the gospel and is concretized in three aspects, mutually related 5. See Sacrosanctum Concilium: Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, art. 59, in Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, ed. Austin Flannery (Northport: Costello, 1975), 20. This can also be accessed at: http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/ documents/vat-ii_const_19631204_sacrosanctum-concilium_en.html. Luther and Liberation 152 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

and developed in his writing The Babylonian Captivity of the Church. 6 Luther saw that every sacrament is comprised of three elements: a) a divine promise (or word); b) an outward sign and c) the faith that receives the promise. The divine promise must be known, proclaimed, recognized, and assumed when celebrating the sacrament. From there, for example, Luther vehemently condemned the practice of just muttering the words of the institution of the Lord’s Supper about the elements of bread and wine, rather than say them audibly. From this, he thought it essential that the celebration of the sacraments be accompanied persistently with the preaching of its significance. In relation to baptism, that promise was detected in the passage of Mark 16:16, “He who believes and is baptized will be saved.”7 This promise, when received in faith, brings about the death of the sinful human being and the reemergence of a new human being. With reference to Rom. 6:4, Luther affirmed, “Baptism, then, signifies two things- death and resurrection, that is, full and complete justification.”8 Regarding the Lord’s Supper, Luther clung to stories concerning the Last Supper of Jesus with his disciples before the Passion, contained in the synoptic Gospels (Matt. 26:26–29, Mark 14:22–25, Luke 22:19–20) and Paul (1 Cor. 11:23–26), detecting in them “a promise of the forgiveness of sins made to us by God, and 6. Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut T. Lehman, eds., Luther’s Works (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1955–), 36:11–126. Cited hereafter as LW. See the extremely positive commentary of a renowned Catholic theologian on this highly controversial writing against the sacramental practice and doctrine of the Catholic Church in the time of the Reformation: Eduardo Hoornaert, “Martim Lutero, um Teólogo que Pensa a partir do Povo,” in Reflexões em torno de Lutero, v. 2, ed. Martin N. Dreher (São Leopoldo: Sinodal, 1984), 9-17. See also chapter 17, II.1.5 in this book. 7. LW 36:58. 8. Ibid., 67. Sacraments 153 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

such a promise as has been confirmed by the death of the Son of God.”9 Where there is a divine offer and promise, there must be a faith that receives and welcomes it. “Wherever there is a divine promise, there faith is required.”10 For anyone can easily see that these two, promise and faith, must necessarily go together. For without the promise there is nothing to be believed; while without faith the promise is useless, since it is established and fulfilled through faith.11 Consequently, Luther could not see as healthy the ignorant and unengaged participation in the sacraments. On the contrary, this was the unworthy participation, which, according to the apostle Paul, is for condemnation (1 Cor. 11:27, 29). The binding of promise and faith was also concretely the theological instrument for the transformation of sacramental practice from a magical rite to a significant sign.12 It is striking to note how many similarities there are in the issue Luther confronted and the one Juan Luis Segundo addressed in his book The Sacraments Today. He also wanted to move “from magic to sign.”13 Without doubt, Luther can help us in this endeavor, although we cannot simply repeat the same process. It is also significant that the Church of the Lutheran Confession faces today precisely the same problem Luther attacked. We will see, that conversely, the Catholic Juan Luis Segundo can help us today, with his sharp observations. We return, however, to Luther one more time. He was decisive about the correlation between promise and faith, and he could even affirm that eventually one could obtain salvation without the 9. Ibid., 38. 10. Ibid., 67. 11. Ibid., 42. 12. Luther’s clear rejection of masses intended for others or for the deceased also appeared there. 13. Juan Luis Segundo, The Sacraments Today, trans. John Drury (Maryknoll: Orbis, 1974), 110. Luther and Liberation 154 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

sacrament, through the promise and faith, but never the other way around, that is, through the sacrament, without the promise and faith. However, Luther did not devalue the sign, as it might seem. Rather, he appreciated it, because God’s promise assumes the concreteness of our things; it “materializes,” so to speak. The loss of the sign is contempt of this concrete will of God, which in this way visibly comforts and strengthens the believer in the promise. The renunciation of the sign can lead to loss of meaning and consequently the promise itself. Thus, for example, Luther reintroduced the distribution of the chalice in the Lord’s Supper, not only because withholding it from the lay people conflicted with the plain meaning of the scriptural passage (“drink it all”14), but also for the concrete loss of the sign. He ultimately condemned the intentional mere participation in the mass.15 He also opted for baptism through immersion,16 because of the sign. And this remained the practice of the Lutheran churches until the eighteenth century, when it was lost. Today the historical memory of that practice has disappeared almost completely.17 2.2 The Word Here we address the promise in baptism, the promise of the Lord’s Supper, the sign, and faith. 14. Matt. 26:27; see also Mark 14:23: “And all drank of it.” 15. There was a fairly widespread custom of attending Mass, without participating in the Supper, except through intention and devotion. 16. The child received a full body “baptismal bath.” 17. This linking of the word, sign and faith, developed by Luther in his writing The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, is also characteristic of the Small and Large Catechisms of Luther (see Small Catechism, in BC, 359–60, and Large Catechism, in BC, 456–62.). In what follows, however, I refer, to that practically unknown in Luther’s writings of 1519 on baptism and the Lord’s Supper: The holy and blessed sacrament of baptism (LW 35:29–43) and The blessed sacrament of the holy and true body of Christ, and the brotherhoods (LW 35:49–73). Sacraments 155 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2.2.1. The Promise in Baptism Luther related his concept of baptism with texts like Titus 3:5 (bath for rebirth) and John 3:3, 5 (rebirth by water and spirit). Analogous to the Christological dogma of the Early Church, Luther made a distinction characteristically, without separating, between the corporeal and the spiritual, a beginning and a process. As with the church, Luther distinguished a “corporal, external Christianity” and an “internal, spiritual Christianity”: Not that we want to separate them from each other; rather, it is just as if I were talking about a man and called him “spiritual” according to his soul, and “physical” according to his body, or as the Apostle is accustomed to speak of an “internal” and “external” man. So, too, the Christian assembly is a community united in one faith according to the soul, although, according to the body, it cannot be assembled in one place since every group of people is assembled in its own place.18 Making use of this distinction, Luther observed that the act of baptism is something quick, but in truth it endures throughout life and is complete only at death. That is, the sign passes once, but the significance remains. “The spiritual baptism, the drowning of sin, which it signifies, lasts as long as we live and is only completed in death.”19 Luther applied this knowledge in two directions, following the image of drowning and rising again, death and resurrection with Christ (Romans 6). There is a dialectic here. On the one hand, although baptism is a death to sin, this does not cease throughout one’s life. Hence there is the need to daily drown sin, to fight it constantly. The formulation in the Small Catechism is classical: The old creature [literally, the Old Adam] in us with all sin and evil 18. LW 39:70 (emphasis mine). Therefore, one should not look at this issue with the current view, clearly dichotomous, of the so-called doctrine of the two kingdoms, which also is misunderstood when interpreted as separation. (See chapter 8: The Reign of God in Church and State.) 19. LW 35:30. Luther and Liberation 156 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

desires is to be drowned and die through daily contrition and repentance and on the other hand that daily a new person is to come forth and rise up to live before God in righteousness and purity forever.20 On the other hand, asserted the Reformer, justice is already established in baptism, but experientially it only begins with it, not yet being complete. On the contrary, it should grow and needs to be unceasingly sought. How does this dual task occur? It specifically occurs as follows: a person already baptized remembers his baptism (past), returns to it through penance, and believes the divine promise contained in it to be true. Thus, looking at the sign, for baptism, for divine grace, it is always recognized as totally pure and innocent. Looking at oneself, however, for one’s life, one has to recognize that one is never sinless and pure in every way. This has merely started. One believes, however, in baptism, and thus moves forward in one’s “purification.” Luther illustrated this dialectic21 with an image of the covenant between God and the human being, established in baptism: In the first place you give yourself up to the sacrament of baptism and to what it signifies. That is, you desire to die, together with your sins, and to be made new, at the Last Day. [. . .] God accepts this desire at your hands and grants you baptism. From that hour he begins to make you a new person. He pours into you his grace and Holy Spirit. [. . .] In the second place you pledge yourself to continue in this desire, and to slay your sin more and more as long as you live, even until your dying day. This too God accepts. He trains and tests you all your life long, with many good works and with all kinds of sufferings.22 Luther then remembered the suffering of the martyrs and noted: 20. Small Catechism, in BC, 360. 21. Note that Luther made no quantitative distinction, as if God in the sacrament does only part of the work, leaving the baptized person to complement it. His perspective is not ontological, but experiential. One is the divine perspective in which everything is already done, the other, human experience in which a vital process occurs. 22. LW 35:33. Sacraments 157 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

“When this does not happen, when we do not suffer and are not tested, then the evil nature gains the upper hand so that a person invalidates his baptism, falls into sin, and remains the same old man he was before.”23 Thus, the human being is in constant practice and “all this takes place in baptism, where Christ is given us.”24 2.2.2. The Promise of the Lord’s Supper In relation to the Lord’s Supper, Luther noted firstly that the word “commune” means to “fellowship with” Christ and our brothers and sisters and not simply just “go to the sacrament.”25 And he illustrated this with 1 Cor. 10:17, “we are all one bread and one body,” and 1 Cor. 12:25-26, where the members of the body are called to care for one another. This is obvious: if anyone’s foot hurts him, yes, even the little toe, the eye at once looks at it, the fingers grasp it, the face puckers, the whole body bends over to it, and all are concerned with this small member; again, once it is cared for all the other members are benefitted.26 Next Luther remembered with Zech. 2:8 that whoever commits evil against others does it to the apple of God’s eye and with Matt. 25:40 that what is done to the least of human beings is done to Christ himself. That is, Luther knew, as we have seen in the context of baptism, that the reality of sin continues to be seen in the believer.27 For this, double help is required. It is necessary that Christ (and his saints) intercede(s) for us with God, partly so that we are not condemned, and partly so that we are admonished for and strengthened against 23. Ibid., 34. 24. Ibid. 25. Ibid., 50–51. 26. Ibid., 52. 27. Or, as Luther was fond of saying, reliquiae peccati, the remnant of sin, now defunct, but still present. Luther and Liberation 158 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

sin. The Lord’s Supper is given to us for both things. In it we see, in the first place, that all these things were accumulated in the body of Christ. He took our sin, we his holy body. Moreover, it is true that we are beset by the devil, by the wickedness of the world, by our bad conscience, and by fear of death and hell; then “all of these make us weary and weak, unless we seek strength in this fellowship, where strength is to be found.”28 Thus, anyone who is afflicted, goes happily to the sacrament of the altar, places their suffering in the community and seeks help in this same community. Because “all my misfortune is shared with Christ and the saints.”29 No one needs to be alone. Who has received a concrete sign of the love of God, conversely has to, in love, bear the burden of others. Here your heart must go out in love and learn that this is a sacrament of love. As love and support are given to you, you in turn must render love and support to Christ in his needy ones. You must feel with sorrow all the dishonor done to Christ in his holy Word, all the misery of Christendom, all the unjust suffering of the innocent, with which the world is everywhere filled to overflowing. You must fight, work, pray, and—if you cannot do more—have heartfelt sympathy.30 Without doubt, it is necessary to recover the memory of this “liberation theologian”! The consequence, according to Luther, will be the world’s opposition, persecution: Now if one will make the afflictions of Christ and of all Christians his own, defend the truth, oppose righteousness, and help bear the needs of the innocent and the sufferings of all Christians, then he will find affliction and adversity enough, over and above that which his evil nature, the world, the devil, and sin daily inflict upon him.31 28. Ibid., 53. 29. Ibid., 54. 30. Ibid. 31. Ibid., 56. Sacraments 159 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

And so, the repeated need of the supper as strengthening and comfort. Thus, in this experiential process and this struggle, Luther inserted the need for frequent and repeated participation in the Lord’s Supper. 2.3. The Sign Due to its fundamental importance, the dimension of the promise contained in the sacraments was addressed more extensively. We now address the dimension of the sign in the sacraments. Concerning baptism, water constitutes the visible sign. The water, in which, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, the baptized is immersed and from which is again raised, marks the drowning of the old and the emergence of the new human being. To give better expression to this meaning, Luther chose baptism through immersion, which in his time had largely been replaced by sprinkling. According to Luther, the child or the person who is baptized should be fully immersed in water and raised again, because this way of celebrating the baptism would be required not only for the etymology of the term “baptism,” but, above all, for its meaning of drowning the old human being characterized by sin and born of flesh and blood, so that the new human being is reborn through the grace of God. “We should therefore do justice to its meaning and make baptism a true and complete sign of the thing it signifies.”32 Not least is the symbolism33 regarding the Lord’s Supper. The bread and wine that the communicants eat and drink are the body 32. Ibid., 29. 33. It is clear that when we talk about symbolism here we do not assume a merely symbolic understanding of the sacrament that negates the real presence of Christ, which Luther never claimed, as is evidenced, among many other testimonies, by the radically irreducible stance that led to his failed dialogue about the Lord’s Supper with Ulrich Zwingli, in 1527, despite the opposing political and theological interests of many friends and princes. See Hermann Sasse, This is my Body: Luther’s Contention for the Real Presence in the Sacrament of the Altar (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1959), 215–94. However, as a sign, allied to the word which makes up the sacrament, bread and wine have their own meaning, which should not be neglected, if Luther and Liberation 160 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

and blood of Christ, signaling the reception of Christ in and among us. The external sign consists of bread and wine, which have to be consumed, for the reception of Christ to be more accurately signaled. When Luther required that both elements (bread and wine) of the communion be distributed to the people, he did not question in an abstract way the theoretical theological validity that Christ is already entirely present in the bread—dispensing, therefore, with the distribution of wine—but he made the practical theological observation that since the Supper is the total and undivided sacrament of communion with God and with others, it would be appropriate to receive the sign not only in part, but in whole.34 For Luther, however, the symbolism was broader. There is one bread, composed, however, of many grains of wheat—thus we, being many are joined together and united into a single body, the community of Christ. The bread, the body of Christ, is broken and distributed to all, the gift of Christ to each. Analogously, there is one wine composed of many grapes, but again distributed to all who receive the saving death of Jesus. Christ with all saints, by his love, takes upon himself our form, fights with us against sin, death, and all evil. This enkindles in us such love that we take on his form, rely upon his righteousness, life, and blessedness. And through the interchange of his blessings and our misfortunes, we become one loaf, one bread, one body, one drink, and have all things in common.35 That is, at the Eucharist the Christian community is strengthened. Within it, each of its components receives Christ. Following the symbolism, drinking and eating are important (specifically, chewing), so that also in the concreteness of the sign there can be no we don’t want to spiritualize or rationalize the sacrament, making it, ultimately, dispensable in practice, which would remain merely the word (promise) and faith, without the sign. 34. LW 35:49–50. 35. Ibid., 58. Sacraments 161 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

doubt that they really received Christ.36 Moreover, just as the bread and wine, having been consumed, become part of our own body, so too Christ and his gifts become ours.37 2.4. Faith We come now to the third dimension of the sacraments, according to Luther: faith. The sacraments are not a magical event, which by the influx of divine power would provoke a new state or a new quality in their receivers. They constitute, rather, the presence of God, concretely marked, effective for the promise and the occasion of a ceaseless process of new life. If this is so, then faith is indispensable. Faith apprehends, receives, and launches new life. Faith clings to the promise of God and thus becomes stronger for love and justice. Because for all who are baptized, their baptism has made the repose, ease, and prosperity of this life a very poison and hindrance to its work. For in the easy life no one learns to suffer, to die [. . .]. Instead there grows only love of this life and horror of eternal life.38 On the other hand, faith is also threatened and shaken. This is all the more reason to seek the Lord’s Supper, because this also strengthens faith, in communion. In the Large Catechism, Luther could classify (repeated) participation in the Lord’s Supper as “a daily food and sustenance so that our faith may be refreshed and strengthened,”39 necessary for those who through (single) baptism are born again. One 36. Hence why the host, that dissolves in the mouth, preventing chewing, although more “practical,” largely undoes the sign. More appropriate is the consumption of normal bread, already part of our everyday reality, and not something a priori sacred. With the host there runs the risk of suggesting a previous sacredness and contempt for its materiality. 37. Ibid., 59–60. It is true, however, that in his treatise The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, Luther greatly diminished the emphasis on the sign. He did it, though, because in this polemic writing what was important to him was to place all emphasis, on the one hand, on the divine promise, and on the other, in faith, with which the human being welcomes the promise. 38. Ibid., 39. 39. Large Catechism, in BC, 469. Luther and Liberation 162 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

could then understand participation in the Supper as a constant return to the baptismal gift. Therefore, Luther did not have in mind the previous existence of a perfect and complete faith, so then the person is empowered to participate in the sacraments, but neither could he admit the reception of the sacrament without faith, though faltering. 3. Conclusion In conclusion, we can observe that the sacraments are gifts of God, embodied in water, bread and wine; received in faith, they determine a personal and communitarian life from Jesus Christ and in service to the world. Luther saw the wholeness of Christian life understood through the sacraments of baptism and of the Lord’s Supper.40 Baptism marks its beginning, the Supper conducts one through all of life and, passing through death, to eternal life. The place of the believer is determined by finding oneself always between baptism, from which we came, and the Supper, for which we aim. One could say that each Lord’s Supper is a sign of a return to the promise of baptism. It is the reiteration of the confidence that God’s promise remains valid; this is learned in faith and experience in the world. III. The Precariousness and Renewal of Sacramental Practice Could we say that we are today, in relation to sacramental practice, in captivity similar to that criticized and overcome by Luther? Undoubtedly, there is a lot of “forgetting” of faith, “remoteness” of the word and “domestication” of the sign. 40. It is known that Luther defended the existence of only two sacraments, baptism and the Lord’s Supper (in The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, 1520, he also included penance). He argued that the other sacraments lacked either the institution by Christ or a concrete external sign. A deeper theological argument, however, is that the two sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper span the entire life of the Christian person, the beginning and its development, until the end and the completion of life. Sacraments 163 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

1. The Threatened Sacraments Juan Luis Segundo’s observation seems important and valid also for Lutherans, in the sense that the “sacramental crisis” arises when there is the intention of renewal of sacramental practice. “All the reasons behind the crisis come from church renewal itself.”41 It is true that the renewal would not have been started if there was not a preliminary perception of inauthenticity in sacramental practice. But the “crisis” is provoked or at least sharpened with the renewal. For example, when one starts doing baptismal courses, one frequently sees how little remains of the evangelical perception of the sacraments and how they are dominated by a magical vision and expectations. Faith was “forgotten.” In baptism it is left to confirmation day, reduced to a ritual remembrance, or perhaps a somewhat pathetic appeal to the commitment of the parents and godparents. In the Lord’s Supper, confession is suppressed or reduced to a brief formula, little importance given to the communitarian dimension, and as for service, it is left outside the temple. When we speak of “forgetting” faith, we do not simply refer to faith as belief, but faith that receives in trust the grace of God and therefore becomes active in love. The theme of faith seems to have been abandoned to revivalist groups, which, in turn, with regard to the sacraments, many times indicate they know very little of its promise. There occurs a “removal” of the word. The sacrament is seen as a mere rite not only in its practice but also in its theological conception. Baptism becomes the work of the believer42 and the Lord’s Supper is limited to the communitarian commemoration of the initiated converts. In the 41. Segundo, 5. 42. Although we will advocate below the optional practice of adult baptism, on a case-by-case basis, instead of obligatory infant baptism, it must be acknowledged that precisely there resides, in the transformation of the sacrament into the work of believers, the inherent risk to the practice of adult baptism, particularly when placed as an absolute requirement. Luther and Liberation 164 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Protestant world, evangelical campaigns that proclaim the necessity of faith—which obviously we do not deny—often neither refer to baptism nor culminate with the celebration of the Supper, losing this concrete means of God’s love to strengthen faith. The “domestication” of the sign, in turn, is also evident. The numerous practical facilities introduced, for the faster unfolding of the sacraments, have as an undeniable premise the total devaluation of the sign and, maybe, a hidden ideal of its suppression, or at least, the reduction of it to a single, tiny, point. In baptism, the water is limited to a few drops; in the Supper, the host dissolves in the mouth. The domestication of the sign culminates, finally, when we can no longer discern the intentionality of a new life for those who are made participants in the death and resurrection of Christ. It is interesting to note that, despite this propensity to devalue the inner meaning and the outward sign of the sacrament (or, perhaps, because of this), its celebration and magical understanding constitute an effective practice for the preservation of the ecclesiastical institutions. In fact, the sacraments are, even in the “church of the word” and notwithstanding the sporadic practice of the Lord’s Supper, the most effective means of maintaining the members in the institution. The price paid, however, is high: loss of personal faith. What one gets in return is equally problematic: the societal inflexibility43 of the Christian community that only receives occasional grace, but is not sent to do anything. The ritual sacramental church is one of the strongest bastions of preserving the status quo. Certainly it is no coincidence also that the powerful, often completely disconnected from the church in the day to day, prepare magnificent feasts to commemorate family baptisms.44 43. Segundo, 81. 44. And, of course, confirmations and weddings. Sacraments 165 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

2. Hope in the Sacraments Here we address the renewal of baptismal practice, the practice of the Lord’s Supper, and the base community as a place of renewal. 2.1 The Renewal of Baptismal Practice The logical consequence of Luther’s thought, when he included the necessity of faith in his conception of the sacrament, leads, according to my understanding, to consider adult baptism a possible option. However, Luther often defended infant baptism.45 Since he did not intend, obviously, to renounce the theological conception that faith (even if only welcoming God’s free promise) is an essential dimension of the sacrament, he had to resort to the theological argument that either the child is rescued by the faith of the family and church or that in God’s plan, the child could also, in her way, believe. The logic of Luther’s thought, however, would lead us to understand the baptism of adults coming to the faith as a normal practice, and the baptism of infants as an exceptional alternative practice in the context of the community of faith. It is possible that Luther did not reach this decision due to the fact that in the very context of the Reformation tendencies arose considering the sacrament “only” as an external rite or then came, in autonomous movements, to require and practice re-baptism. In the theological premise that baptism is, above all, a manifestation of God’s grace, the repetition of baptism is clearly an abuse that calls into question 45. See, for example, LW 36:73: “Infants are aided by the faith of others, namely, those who bring them for baptism.” And the Large Catechism, in BC, 464: “We bring the child with the intent and hope that it may believe, and we pray God to grant it faith,” understanding that by God’s grace infants may also, in their way, have faith or be engaged by the faith of the parents, godparents and the community. The Augsburg Confession added condemnation of the Anabaptists to the defense of the practice of infant baptism (Augsburg Confession, article 9, in BC, 42, 43). Intending to enhance the fidelity of the Lutheran Reformation to the universal church, the Confession decided to distance itself radically from the Anabaptist movement, with highly unfortunate consequences (see chapter 6: The Church—People of God, note 29). Luther and Liberation 166 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

this preponderance of grace in the promise. The practice of rebaptism converts baptism clearly into a human work, even though it constitutes itself in the first work of fidelity of the one who has come to grace through faith. The fundamental dimension of free promise is denied. Although we criticize re-baptism or even adult baptism as an exclusive practice of the Christian community, it is clear that Luther would never have introduced infant baptism, from his theological premises, if it were not already standard practice in the Church. His theology gives convincing support to the denial of the practice of rebaptism but he would not support the introduction of the practice of infant baptism if it had not already existed. Even in the Large Catechism, where Luther defended the legitimacy of infant baptism, asserting that “for my faith does not make baptism; rather, it receives baptism,”46 which is the work of God, the Reformer sees the need to ensure that “God’s works are salutary and necessary for salvation, and they do not exclude but rather demand faith, for without faith one cannot grasp them.”47 Basically, infant baptism only retains meaning within a family and communitarian “Christian” environment, or even socially, in an environment of Christendom. It is quite possible that Luther, who still faced social organization in a model of Christendom—no longer weighed down with the tutelage of the Church over secular power—also saw in Anabaptist practice an unacceptable seed for social dissolution. In this context, the rejection of infant baptism could be understood as sedition, to the extent that it undid social unity. Therein lies the reason why Luther, who has always defended personal freedom of religious conscience, gave in the 1530s, largely under the influence of his friend and companion Philip Melanchthon, 46. Large Catechism, in: BC, 463. 47. Ibid., 461. Sacraments 167 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

his support—albeit with some tenuous caveats—to the unfortunate exhortation presented to the authorities to suppress by force the Anabaptist movement, both violent and peaceful, applying even the death penalty provided for crimes of sedition and blasphemy. It was, certainly, a completely lamentable posture. In this in particular, the comprehensive position, almost complacent of an unsuspected author, Roland H. Bainton, himself a Mennonite, inheritor of the Anabaptist tradition, comes as a surprise. He understood, that in the specific context in which he encountered it, “Luther’s leniency” toward the Anabaptists “is the more to be remarked than his severity.” And he concluded: He did insist to the end that faith is not to be forced, that in private a man may believe what he will, that only revolt or public attack on the orthodox teaching should be penalized- in his own words, that only sedition and blasphemy rather than heresy should be subject to constraint.48 However, returning to the theological premises of Luther, it is questionable when, for the common practice of infant baptism, as it were, one establishes in practice a chronological distance—certainly not a theological one in theory—between God’s work and the reception of faith. It follows, at least in a context of pluralism with regard to religious practices and convictions, that the arguments that Luther was forced to employ to justify the practice of infant baptism—preponderantly that the infants themselves could have faith49—all have a certain degree of artificiality. Nevertheless, it has to be granted that neither can faith be reduced to a mere intellectual 48. Roland H. Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther (New York: Abingdon-Cokesbury, 1950), 375–78, quotations, 378. 49. The other “solutions” proposed for the dilemma “infant baptism—faith,” attributing this vicariously to the parents, godparents, and community (as in The Babylonian Captivity of the Church, LW 36:73–74) or referring to the future confession of faith of the baptized person (eventually, in confirmation) are more “realistic,” but even less convincing for the understanding of the sacrament (which, as we have seen, presupposes faith). Thus, the diversity Luther and Liberation 168 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

assent, by which faith would become dependent on human rational understanding. In an environment of religious disengagement, indifference, and secularized pluralism, which characterizes current society, the indiscriminate practice of infant baptism assumes the contours of deep perversion. It becomes an imposition on people unable to resist, from other people uninterested in living one’s own baptism. This is what happens when we baptize in an indiscriminate way when asked to so often—and this by people that do not ask for themselves but for their children or affiliates. The fact that in the practice of many communities the only criteria for any refusal to baptize is the non-payment of an ecclesiastical financial contribution only serves to accentuate the perversion. Consequently, ecumenical dialogue has highlighted the need for churches who “practice infant baptism” to do it judiciously and “take more seriously their responsibility for the nurture of baptized children to mature commitment to Christ.”50 Little has been done about the latter51 and virtually nothing to prevent the practice of indiscriminate baptism. Why? Certainly it is not merely ill will, because the churches as a rule want active members. My suspicion is the reason is that infant baptism is the most effective means to maintain the already indifferent members within the institutional church. The order in force in the IECLB, approved in 1972, allowed freedom of choice for the baptism of adults or infants.52 This option of theological arguments and the oscillation in its use are indicative of being, in good measure at least, a rationalization of an existing practice. 50. World Council of Churches, Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry (Geneva: World Council of Churches, 1982), 6 (nr. 16). In turn, the churches, which practice believers´ baptism are asked “to seek to express more visibly the fact that children are placed under the protection of God´s grace” (Ibid.). 51. The practice of the so-called pre-baptismal lectures (or short courses) with fathers, mothers and godparents, meanwhile, usual in a good number of Lutheran communities, is a good step in this direction. 52. Nossa Fé—Nossa Vida: Um Guia de Vida Comunitária em Fé e Ação (São Leopoldo: Sinodal, Sacraments 169 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

is important because it does not prescribe a legalistic way. As the baptism of adults imposed on others would be in practice a true decree of exclusion from the church, it seems more advisable that people identified with the Christian faith make use of this freedom for themselves and their families. It would be a gesture that points to the significance of baptism (death and resurrection), being, therefore, more apt to awaken the sleeping conscience of the Christian community. 2.2. The Renewal of the Practice of the Lord’s Supper If Juan Luis Segundo said that there is in Catholicism a true “sacramental intoxication,”53 so frequent, magical, and cumulative, in this case the situation within the IECLB is the opposite. The strange thing is that even when the normal practice (in statistical terms) in the IECLB is participation in the Supper once per year, it still exercises a magical and conservative role. Once a year the evangelical masses gather, who are, on this occasion, for all practical effects confirmed in their life conduct. Rarely is there a community that celebrates the communion with Christ and with each other, mutually comforting, carrying each other’s burdens, and strengthening themselves for the work of love and justice among others. On the contrary, it is a powerful vehicle for everything to remain as it is, carrying one’s load, and solidifying injustice. The frequent celebration of the Supper is an indispensable condition to rediscover its significance. It is clear, however, that frequency in and of itself will advance little. To approach the true meaning, every Supper should be accompanied by reflection and 1972), 21. Previous ecclesiastical orders prescribed baptism for the first few months (or weeks) of life. See, for example: “If possible, children should receive baptism during the first six weeks of their lives.” See Ordem de Vida Ecclesiástica nas Comunidades do Sínodo Evangélico de Santa Catarina e Paraná (Rio do Sul, s/ed., 1956), art. II, 2. [Translation by T. Cooper.] 53. Segundo, 34. Luther and Liberation 170 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

preaching about its meaning and should be placed in the context of a broad community experience. 2.3 The Base Community as a Place of Renewal It is necessary to be well aware that sole changes in sacramental practice will not result in the living rediscovery of the meaning of the sacraments. Rightly, Segundo pointed to the fact that the sacramental crisis is a crisis of the church.54 A church of the masses is practically only capable of receiving the sacrament, rather than celebrating it, perhaps to console, but difficult to move itself forward. It tends to perpetuate in itself generally egocentric individualism; it is practically inoperative for communitarian action in solidarity. Almost inevitably it must disregard all human and social problems, though the sacraments should strengthen one for their solution. It does not fight, but hides, injustices. From there it is possible to conclude that, in the final analysis, with its practice, it also abandons the individual to fend for himself, instead of helping him. There the sacraments are the tomb of the Christian community. There is, therefore, a “crisis over the coherence and meaningfulness of the Christian community” and it is necessary to reach a “correspondence between what they [the sacraments] signify and the reality of the Christian community in the world.”55 The alternative is clear: base community. In its “classic” sense, as usual in the Catholic Church in Latin America, the formation of base communities depends on the structures of the masses, since practically only there can one have the identification between the (small) civil and religious community, typical for these base communities that share faith and living conditions. For minority churches, like the IECLB, whose cohesion, through a context predominantly of 54. Ibid., 3. 55. Ibid., 38. Sacraments 171 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

another religious option, depends less on one’s experience of life in common than on one’s confessional identification (here and there, cultural), the concept “base community” is representative of those forces and movements that seek to solidify the bonds of communion and solidarity in small groups, often with popular characteristics, with intense communitarian and celebratory activity.56 Between brothers and sisters—where two or three are gathered in Jesus’ name (Matt. 18:20)—where the community hears the call for a new life, experiences the forgiveness of Christ, follows in discipleship, stands in the history of God’s love, assists the afflicted, supports the oppressed, fights evil, sin and injustice, there the sacraments almost by themselves are transformed into highly significant signs and will be the cradle of the Christian community. It remains to make an observation about the practical way to accomplish this goal. In the first place, it is necessary to make this pastoral choice with base communities—with clarity and perseverance. There will always be resistance, and this is likely to grow, to the extent that such base communities not only “enliven” so-called “traditional” parish communities but also lead to a new practical commitment to the marginalized people of society. Therefore, the practical renewal must be accompanied by the constant invitation to participate in this evangelical option, explaining the reasoning—although one should not have the naïve belief that when explanations are given well they will always be able to undo resistance, in those in whom one finds a basic interest in maintaining established social privileges. Sometimes the question arises, at least in the minority Protestant environment whether this option should be taken aside from the church of the masses. I do not believe that here it is a generic option. There will be occasions where a radical break is needed, and 56. See also chapter 6: The Church—Poor People of God. Luther and Liberation 172 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

others, which will require perseverance in dialogical action through the structures. Incidentally, the rupture will be the only coherent option when there are sufficiently strong reasons to believe that the alternative within the church of the masses definitely does not present any reasonable positive perspectives or when the call for the break is of extreme urgency, so that the slower conscientizing action within the structures virtually precludes an authentic response. Juan Luis Segundo himself, who emphasized minority communities, warned that we should not minimize the possibilities of the church of the masses.57 After all, in them there is a majority who is not at fault but victimized by this ecclesiastical distortion and of its consequent sacramental perversion. Nor can we overlook, in the church of the Reformation and of the word, on the one hand an active solidarity, albeit under denunciation, with sinners (among whom also we find ourselves), and on the other hand, the potential inherent in the word itself. The major changes that occurred during the Reformation, through the word, that was concrete action itself, can be for us an encouraging example. Finally, we cannot fail to realize that reality itself with its social transformations led to a growing religious mobility. There has been a significant growth of Pentecostal and neo-Pentecostal churches. Some emphasize the reconciling in the shape of communities, with intense mutual support among its members. Others, on the contrary, have made a choice for mass initiatives, in which people seek relief from a difficult situation in their life. Not a few members of the Catholic Church, and also of the historical Protestant churches have been attracted by these new proposals in the “religious market.” However, this is also fertile ground in which BECs can form in the same historical churches, which serve as a ferment for the whole church and a vehicle for a more mature faith 57. Segundo, 110–14, especially 113. Sacraments 173 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

and great practice of solidarity. In this, the sacramental experience could be of comfort, encouragement, and strengthening of faith. Luther and Liberation 174 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:12:28 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

8 The Reign of God in Church and State I am interested in the question of “Church and State” because of the urgency and priority it acquires, when we focus on the fate of the people, the oppressed and, ultimately, all of humanity. I. The Significance of the Question of Church and State Certainly, it is a particularly pressing issue in our Latin American historical moment and context, when in many countries, after secular independence, domination and oppression, sharpened by the struggle for survival, attempts to dignify life through reducing poverty and social inequality are tested. Never should the church distance itself or exercise neutrality in social and political questions, even less when it unveils real possibilities of building more just and dignified relations. In our Latin American history, the church(es) have been predominantly an instrument of domination. Could they become in our time predominantly an instrument of liberation? This question was already present in chapter 6. Undoubtedly, however, the question cannot be answered in advance. For only the historical process in the longer term will answer. In any case, one 175 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:14:56 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

can observe that there where the church(es) come to exercise their prophetic mission and transformative action, they come to focus on the conflicts that characterize our societies. This conflictive reality manifests itself not only from outside but also within the church(es) themselves. Perhaps less than it was a few decades ago, the view that the church as such, and possibly even individual Christians, should in no way engage in politics, is still widespread in our church(es). It should abstain from social and political questions, primarily its ministers. Without doubt, it is not a problem exclusive to Lutherans, because this conception is discovered, in different varieties and intensities, in all churches, including Catholic, which traditionally was not averse to direct political participation. However, it was within Lutheranism that the so-called “doctrine of the two kingdoms” developed, which has been used as ideological legitimation for the failure to act on political issues. In one particular configuration, the doctrine served to shape a majority share of German evangelical Christianity to the will and atrocities of the Nazi regime in the Third Reich. On the Latin American continent, this same doctrine was used as legitimation for the division of Chilean Lutheranism, when it made concrete gestures of support and assistance to Chilean and foreign refugees threatened by the military regime led by Pinochet. Forty years after the military coup (1973) and more than two decades after the return to a democratic regime in Chile, only now is the perspective unfolding of a cautious reunification of Chilean Lutheranism, while preserving the peculiarities of the two churches, which were constituted separately with radically distinct positions in the face of the regime implemented by Pinochet. Can one attribute the doctrine of the “two kingdoms,” with that particular interpretation, to Luther, or would this be a total distortion Luther and Liberation 176 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:14:56 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

of what Luther advocated? Or, perhaps, would we have something to learn from him, surprisingly and precisely on this issue? II. Church and State under the Reign of God The dichotomous dualism between Church and State cannot be legitimately ascribed to Luther. It is true that he made a distinction of competencies between them, but he never separated them into autonomous entities. The distinction seemed to him an indispensable task. 1. The Two Realms of God’s Activity His intention was very clear: to stand against the perversion of the Church into a temporal and political power. This is already apparent in the 95 Theses, in which he condemns the traffic in indulgences. The Church must offer the free forgiveness of God in Christ and not take advantage of it as a source of revenue. This same distinction is found very clearly in To the Christian Nobility of the German Nation Concerning the Reform of the Christian Estate (1520),1 in which he turned radically against the political power of popes and bishops, who were often also political authorities, against the system of feudal ecclesiastical properties, against the civil jurisprudence of the Church, against its complicated and diverse fiscal system, and so on. All this created, in the name of the gospel, a concrete system of exploitation of the people, in particular the people most deprived of resources. One cannot forget this front of the struggle, when Luther emphasized the specific mission of the Church as a witness of God’s word. At the same time, we must remember that the dignifying of the 1. Jaroslav Pelikan and Helmut T. Lehman, eds., Luther’s Works (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1955–), 44:123–217. Cited hereafter as LW. The Reign of God in Church and State 177 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:14:56 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

political and social office in its broadest sense occurred in Luther, including and in particular for those who profess the Christian faith. Luther directed himself to the Christian nobility, making them see that their political office is derived not from an autonomous and arbitrary competency, but from the universal priesthood as baptized Christians. They have, then, to exercise, as Christian people who find themselves in political office, the task of the necessary political, social, and economic reform of the German nation. Analogously, Luther responded in a positive way to the question as to the legitimacy and necessity for Christians to exercise other public professions and functions, which are, for example, in the field of law (as judges) but also the military, as soldiers. Luther never had the intention of making Church and State autonomous entities. It was for political authority to make social, economic, and political reforms that inevitably would also affect the Church as a social institution; but it was incumbent on the Church to confront the political authorities with the will of God, an unavoidable task. For the so-called “Two Kingdoms” are distinguished in task and means, but they overlap in space. They are linked at their base and in their purpose: God is the Lord of both; the human being, the purpose of both. Thus, State and Church remain instrumental to what is greater to them, limiting them and linking them reciprocally. The State limits and regulates the Church as social institution (for example, in matters of property). The Church, for its part, proclaims the will of God to the State (for example, criticizing its arbitrariness or summoning it to political, economic, and social transformations necessary for the good of the citizens). In this way, Luther always felt compelled to address political authorities, who were princes, nobles, or municipal councils, with many social, economic, and political demands and advice, many times wise, sometimes tragic and lamentable. Never, however, did he seek neutrality or abstention. Luther and Liberation 178 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:14:56 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms

Therefore, Luther never thought of the “secularization” of the political sphere, in the modern-liberal sense of the separation of Church and State, which was promoted only with the advent of the Enlightenment. In a way, perhaps he had opened a path for it; research shows that there were Lutherans in the United States who found in the “doctrine of the Two Kingdoms” legitimation for the separation of Church and State adopted in that country.2 Norwegian Lutherans, to give another example, found in Luther help for their resistance to the Nazi invasion and occupation.3 In Brazil, the growth of Pentecostalism that, contrary to its origins, assumed strong political involvement, many times with a particular “evangelical” agenda, has intensified discussion around the “secular State.” Although the traditional separation of Church and State, also anchored in the Brazilian Constitution, has to be defended against efforts to impose a religious agenda on Brazilian society as a whole (very evident in moral questions, such as abortion and homosexual relationships), the term “secular State” has been used also in a rather dubious sense and even with a discriminatory bias in relation to religion. Now, the separation of Church and State, an achievement of modernity, has its rationale in its rejection of theocratic states or a social and political order that concedes or guarantees privileges for one or more religions or churches, to the detriment of others and to the population that does not adhere to any of them. That is, the State must guarantee equal rights to all citizens, independent of their possible religious affiliation, and it cannot privilege specific segments. In this sense, the concept of “secular State” needs to be defended and 2. See Karl H. Hertz, ed., Two Kingdoms and One World: A Sourcebook in Christian Social Ethics (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1976) and Karl Hertz, “The Two Kingdoms Debate—A Look at the American Situation,” in Lutheran Churches—Salt or Mirror of Society?: Case Studies on the Theory and Practice of the Two Kingdoms Doctrine, ed. Ulrich Duchrow (Geneva: LWF, 1977), 243–54. 3. Torleiv Austad, “The Doctrine of God’s Twofold Governance in the Norwegian Church Struggle from 1940 to 1945: Fifteen Theses,” in Ibid., 84–94. The Reign of God in Church and State 179 This content downloaded from 132.174.252.140 on Wed, 19 Jan 2022 14:14:56 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms