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God and Revolution: Protestant Missions in Revolutionary Guatemala, 1944-1954

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

Virginia Garrard Burnett
Virginia Garrard Burnett*
Affiliation:
University of Texas, Austin, Texas
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Extract

“Our institutions,” remarked a North American Protestant missionary in Guatemala in 1910 referring to his denomination's missions, schools and clinics, “can do more than gunboats.” From the time of the Liberal reform of Justo Rufino Barrios, most of Guatemala's Liberal rulers had agreed. Valued by nineteenth century Liberal rulers for their development projects, their usefulness in the struggle against Catholic clericalism, and, most importantly, for the packaging of North American values, beliefs and culture in which they wrapped the Word of God, Protestant missionaries worked in Guatemala with the blessing and encouragement of the government from the late nineteenth century until 1944. That year, the “last caudillo”—the old Liberal dictator Jorge Ubico —was ousted from power and replaced by a reformist junta, marking the beginning of Guatemala's decade-long flirtation with progressive revolutionary government.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Americas , Volume 46 , Issue 2 , October 1989 , pp. 205 - 223
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1989

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References

1 Guatemalan Mission to Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions (hereinafter cited as PBFM), 3 May 1910, PBFM letters 1903–1911.

2 de Guatemala, Gobierno, Recopilación de las leyes emitidas por el gobierno de la República de Guatemala, tomo 1, June 1871-July 1881 (Guatemala: Tipográfia de “El Progreso”, 1881), p. 174 Google Scholar; see also, Burgess, Paul, Justo Rufino Barrios (New York: Dorrance & Co. 1926), pp. 109–110 Google Scholar; Mecham, J. Lloyd, Church and State in Latin America: A History of Politico-Ecclesiastic Relations (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1966), p. 319 Google Scholar; Miller, Hubert J., Iglesia y estado en el tiempo de Justo Rufino Barrios (Guatemala: Universidad de San Carlos, 1976).Google Scholar

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17 CAB #266(1946):3; Harvester, 26 (12–13):10, “Resultados de la campaña de alfabetización por el comité del sínodo,” El Cristiano, 42 (472):5–6.

18 Minutes of the Annual Meeting, October 1945, p. 1, IENP.

19 El Mensajero, 41 (2):18; see also Pro-Alfabetización Nacional (hereinafter cited as PAN) 1945–1961; PAN 3 (2):3.

20 PAN 3 (2):3.

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22 CAB #266 (1946):3.

23 PAN 2 (8):1, 4; El Mensajero Evangélico, 41 (7):23–25; El Mensajero, 39 (10):5; El Mensajero, 39 (9):4.

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29 Schlesinger, p. 42.

30 El Noticiero Evangélico, 29 (263):110–11.

31 Paul Burgess to PBFM, 3 November 1950, IENP.

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39 Narrative Report of the Guatemala Station, 1949, IENP; Leonard, pp. 75, 80–96.

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41 Burgess to PBFM, 20 September 1950, IENP.

42 Burgess to Ruth Wardel, 18 November 1950, IENP; AGCA, Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores, “Ingresos de religiosos,” p. 565.

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47 CAB #318 (1953):10.

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49 Boletín de la Iglesia Central Presbiteriana, 5 July 1953; 6 December 1953; 1 June 1952.

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57 Miller, p. 8.

58 “Carta Abierta, Cantel Enero 1954, ‘A los politicastros evangélicos: David Ordóñez Colóp, Gabriel Sam Chue, Obispo Salaníc Salaníc, Felipe Santiago Colóp García, Juan Itcep y otros, con motivo de la manifestación de los ‘revoltosos’ no REVOLUCIONARIA del 13 de diciembre próximo pasado,”’ IENP; “Presbyterian Agrarians,” Guatemala News, 44 (6):3–5.

59 Ibid.

60 “Presbyterian Agrarians,” Guatemala News, 44 (6):3–5.

61 Guatemala News, 45 (1):3

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63 Schlesinger, p. 42.

64 Guatemala News, 43 (1):3.

65 AGCA, Ministério de Relaciones Exteriores, “Ingresos de religiosos,” 565, 16 August 1952; 16 July 1951; 22 July 1950; 4 September 1953; 24 July 1952.

66 Ibid., 16 July 1951; 24 July 1952; 16 August 1952.

67 Ibid., 22 July 1950; 16 July 1951; 24 July 1952; 16 August 1952; 4 September 1953.

68 Ibid., 16 July 1951.

69 Ibid., 16 August 1952.

70 Christmas letter from the Paul Burgess family, 1954, IEPN.