Religious others: explorations on diversity and pluralism in early twentieth-century Argentina

GUSTAVO ANDRÉS LUDUEÑA

Cambridge

Conferencia; Open Seminars of the Centre of Latin American Studies; 2010

Centre of Latin American Studies, University of Cambridge

One thing I can strongly remember of my childhood in Argentina was some kind of familiar meetings. Usually carried out on weekends, these meetings were characterized by ritualized suppers with typical asados (i.e. barbecues) or pastas, mainly, for those of Italian background like me. In such events it was common to listen a repeated recommendation of adults. En la mesa no se habla de política ni de religión [?it is not allowed to talk about politics or religion in the table?]. Perhaps, this statement show us more evidently than any other the image of a scene were actors perform tensions that, indeed, are present in their everyday life as well as in other levels of social life. Familiar events like the one above mentioned were conceived of as moments of family communitas and not as theatralizations of national dramas. For that reason, topics that might potentially get people into confrontation, like those of politics and religion, were strongly suggested to be left aside of the talk. In some degree, and assuming that both this statement is rooted in the past and it shows a strong symbolic relation between politics and religion, my aim is to bring some elements for its comprehension. Even when it is not my intention to answer in full the reason of such adult recommendation, in this presentation I certainly pretend to bring some clues about this behaviour. More specifically, I will adopt the premise that these spheres were close related to the difficulties of making a ?plural? society in which ?diversity? could be included into the social, political and religious life of the whole nation. In this regard, another starting point shall be that both fields ?religion and politics? were arenas of confrontation and debate. Rather, by focusing particularly on the sphere of religion I will argue that this was extremely reluctant to the inclusion of what we can envision as a ?religious other?. In other words, more specifically, it will be stated that in the realm of religion in Argentina diversity was developed by means of a symbolic logic that mutated that ?other? into a very religious otherness. So to speak, this happened with Jews, Protestants and Spiritists, among other denominations. A fourth statement, therefore, will be that this situation started to be so along with the development of a well specialized space of activity in society, which was that of religious practices and beliefs. Finally, as a consequence of the latter, it was the result of an unequal evolution of religious actors in terms of legitimacy and power that ?diversity? but not ?pluralism? characterized the Argentinean religious field from then onwards. In this vein, I follow James Beckford?s definitions on diversity and pluralism. He argues that there are different meanings of ?diversity?. In this paper I take two of them: 1) diversity is ?the absolute number of separate religious organizations or faith traditions that are represented? in a country; and, 2) diversity is ?a process whereby a formerly unitary religious tradition undergoes a process of internal differentiation into separate sects or schools?. On other hand, ?pluralism? is related to diversity in the sense that it calls attention on the social ?acceptance or recognition in the public sphere? of that diversity. In short, pluralism is about the ?support for the moral or political value of widening the public acceptance of religions?. In other words, following the same author, ?religious diversity or the juxtaposition of faith communities does not mean that they are all necessarily regarded as equally acceptable or good. Processes of social construction select those that are regarded as acceptable and those that are not?.          In order to address these arguments, I shall take into account the role of three important agents that influenced those processes. First, I will deal with some particular changes in society, which were chiefly represented by the transformation of the urban environment, the presence of migrants, and the emergence of a novel citizenship. In this regard, all these changes granted life to a sociability that included religion as part of the everyday life and, in some cases, as part of the organization of social and communitarian life as such. Second, I will present the Catholic Church as another protagonist of the origin and complexity of the Argentinean religious field, in particular, in relation to the acceptance and production of senses about other ?non-Catholic? beliefs and practices. Regarding the institutional and the religious dimension, the church was undergoing serious transformation because of different factors like, for example, the diffusion of its presence throughout the country; its adoption of the Roman model of organisation; the inclusion of new members of European origin; and the strong ordering in terms of ritual and doctrine. Third, the role of the state shall be pointed out with the aim of explore and analyze its responsibility in the treatment of religious diversity. In this vein, I shall show the will of the state in controlling non-Catholic expressions along ?simultaneously? with a liberal commandment of leaving place to freedom of consciousness in the election of beliefs.