The Catholic Church in Haiti: Political and Social Change. - book reviews

The role of the Catholic church in Haiti's desperate struggle has been both celebrated and maligned, and rightly so. Anne Greene's account of the church's part in the overthrow of Jean-Claude Duvalier evokes memories of the high point of Haitian church history. It also provokes questions about Haiti's current plight.

The first two chapters present overviews of church and state in Latin America and Haiti. Unfortunately, the treatment is too superficial to create the needed context. Key actors and events are left out. For example, I was dismayed that there is no mention of Charlemagne Peralte, the resistance fighter executed by the U.S. occupying forces in 1919.

These initial chapters indicate the dominate role played by the United States in Haitian history. U.S.-Haitian diplomatic blunders are sprinkled throughout the text. Greene makes ample use of early church documents and deals extensively with the seeds of twentieth-century church-state tensions: the long battle surrounding the Concordat of 1860, which granted the government approval over naming bishops; the stormy anti-Voodoo campaigns of the hierarchy even in the face of widespread Voodoo practice on the part of rural Catholics; the influence of eighteenth-century French anticlericalism and its rekindling because of the Catholic church's support of the U.S. occupation from 1919 to 1935.

The meat of the volume is in two chapters covering the rule of Jean-Claude Duvalier, 1971-86. During this period, a new concept of mission, involving a prophetic outreach toward rural Haitians and away from the urban, mulatto elite, was reinforced by liberation theology, a native clergy, and the growth of basic Christian communities. This new pastoral plan put the church on a collision course with the government. The church shifted its attention to the countryside, working in education, economic development, health, and literacy. Most important, it trained peasant leaders. The changed approach was clearly a preferential option for the poor tailored to Haitian needs, including a homegrown, Scripture-based adaptation of Catholic social thought and liberation theology's action-reflection-praxis methodology. In spite of these changes, Greene quotes a U.S. embassy spokesman, "... religion was not an influential institution in Haitian national affairs." As the heat was turned up on Jean-Claude, the author rightly points out the shortsightedness of such an assessment.

The book goes on to document the seminal role played by the Haitian Conference of Religion (CHR) and the impact made by John Paul II in his 1983 visit. The Holy Father's cry that "things must change" electrified Haitians and just about electrocuted Baby Doc. In December 1983, the bishops issued their Charte de L'Eglise pour la Promotion Humaine which endorsed programs for peasant organization, literacy, and rural development. The CHR, Ti Legliz, Caritas, Bon Nouvel, and numerous church-related rural training centers sprang into action and mobilized the rural sector.

Greene is emphatic in pointing out the focal part played by Radio Soleil, the Catholic station, and its director, Father Hugo Triest, a Missionhurst priest. The station was the cement holding efforts together.

The death knell for Jean-Claude began with the trumped-up referendum on July 22, 1985. Father Triest predicted fraudulent elections and his predictions proved accurate. Soleil reporters followed the bogus voters around Port-au-Prince as they were transported by government bus in order to vote early and often. In spite of the massive boycott, the government immediately announced that 90 percent of the people voted and that 99.98 percent supported Duvalier. Power was cut off at Radio Soleil and Father Triest was arrested. The next day a Belgian missionary was beaten to death with a nail-studded club. Since the priest looked like Father Triest, many suspected a case of mistaken identity. On July 24, Triest and two other missionaries were expelled. But the events caused the pot to boil over. Finally food strikes and the November 8 massacre by military and macoutes (Duvalier's personal special forces) in Gonaives, coupled with the closing of Radio Soleil on December 4, brought the people into the streets. In January, the U.S. embassy weighed in by refusing to recertify Haiti for foreign assistance. The military continued, true to form, by turning machine guns on innocent civilians in the city of Leogane. A week later on February 7, 1986, Jean-Claude Duvalier drove his own BMW to the airport and exile.

Greene is rightly enthusiastic in her praise of "priests...nuns, development, literacy and media workers ... who had taken to heart the papal injunctions and conference messages to work with the poor....Many of them repeatedly risked their lives on behalf of justice for the poor." It was, indeed, the high point in Haitian church history.

The two final chapters discuss the post-Duvalier period and briefly the Aristide presidency. Unfortunately, they appear to be quick add-ons with glaring omissions. There is no mention of the constitutional elections of March 29, 1987, in which the church played a key role.

While the book addresses a most important topic, overall it is a disappointment. The author makes good use of written sources but appears to have little first-hand knowledge of the church. Historical accuracy would have been enhanced by some elucidation of the distinction between the hierarchy and the church at the base, a subject much discussed in Haiti. Peasants refer to Ti Legliz, the "little church"; priests and sisters often used the Lumen gentium term "People of God." Episcopal statements did provide cover for church workers but it was clearly the church at the base which led the way in the overthrow of Baby Doc. As Greene indicates in a note on page 209, the bishops and the papal nuncio might well have been reluctant followers.

A second criticism reflects a profound misreading of events and does not even follow from the text. In a bewildering statement, the author contends that "the rural sector did not participate in the overthrow of President Duvalier." On the contrary, it was precisely the rural Groupmans, Tet Ansamn groups, local Caritas organizations, and the Ti Legliz linked up by the Radio Soleil transmitter that rallied the cities to action.

The church in Haiti had a moment of glory. "Viv Legliz" was a common chant during the resistance and overthrow of Baby Doc. Subsequently, church people, often as martyrs, helped to rid Haiti of Generals Namphy and Avril. The church at the base is still resisting dictatorship and praying for democracy. It is still being hunted and killed. Things have not changed much--except that the silence of the bishops is all the more deafening.

Confronted with 4,000 killed by a brutal military, 40,000 boat people, rising neo-Duvalierism, a diplomatic impasse (if indeed there ever was a diplomatic opening), and what appears to be a tentative but growing armed insurgency, what should the church's stance be? Why does the church, which was able to mobilize the peasants and the urban poor to dump a dictator, now appear so powerless to help create and support viable political institutions? Most importantly, why is the official church so fearful of supporting one of her own who took the message to heart?

REVIEWERS

JAY R. Mandle is professor of Economics at Colgate University. He is the co-author, with Louis A. Ferleger, of the recently published book, A New Mandate: Democratic Choices for a Prosperous Economy (University of Missouri Press).

JOHN P. HOGAN was director of Catholic Relief Services in Haiti and has written frequently Commonweal.

JAMES FINN is senior editor of Freedom Review, the bimonthly magazine published by Freedom House. He has written frequently about questions of war, legality, and morality.

TIMOTHY A. BYRNES, who teaches political science at Colgate University, spent the spring of 1993 in Poland on a Fullbright grant.

DAVID HOLLENBACH, S.J., recently published Catholicism and Liberalism: Contributions to American Public Philosophy, edited with R. Bruce Douglass (Cambridge University Press). He is Margaret O'Brien Flatley Professor of Catholic Theology at Boston College.

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