This essay considers Christianity in countries in the region that belong to France and are French-speaking. The island nations of Guadeloupe, Martinique, Saint Martin and Saint Barthélemy form the French Antilles, while French Guiana is the only part of the South American mainland that is ruled by France. Until 2019, the United Nations classification treated both Saint Martin and Saint Barthélemy as part of Guadeloupe. Since the statistics that inform the tables in this book are based on the UN 2017 classification, there are no separate tables for these two countries.

Two decisive developments have shaped the Christian presence: the colonisation that occurred in the first half of the seventeenth century and the changes that occurred in the region since the 1970s, in the wake of the Second Vatican Council. Both have had repercussions lasting to the present day.

The trafficking of enslaved people from Africa was authorised by Louis XIII in 1675 in order to replace white workers from various regions of France, including the Antilles. The Black Code of 1685 (published following the revocation of the Edict of Nantes) governed the practices of slavery, which continued until the mid-nineteenth century and marked the history of this part of the world. Both the Dutch and the French imported a significant number of enslaved Africans, in order to work on the cotton, tobacco and sugar plantations.

Christianity came at the same time as colonisation, introduced by Catholic missionary orders, including the Jesuits, Dominicans, Capuchins and Carmelites. Protestants and Jews, who had been arriving since the beginning of colonisation in 1635, were prohibited from conducting their worship services openly. However, the supposed conversion of the Africans was forced and was used as a justification for slavery. Resistance to slavery was punctuated by sporadic revolts and maroonism – the flight to places inaccessible to the owners.

As missionaries were paid in slaves to work on their own plantations, they were not inclined to support slave revolts. But, paradoxically, in all French colonial possessions, Africans showed strong adherence to worship and the sacraments (baptisms, Masses, various devotions to saints). These religious activities offered slaves a place of support and even refuge for African beliefs and, at the same time, they facilitated the organisation of resistance against slavery, thanks to gatherings in the different parishes of the region.

Today, as in the past, the Afro-American communities in Latin America and the Caribbean live the Christian experience rooted in their own particular cultural context, but open to and in dialogue with the experiences of Indigenous peoples, mestizos and whites. They constitute a population of approximately 133 million, scattered throughout the continent and the islands, who have suffered a structural racism that has also been expressed in Christian religious institutions.

Since the 1990s, and in particular as a result of the reflection on the significance of 500 years of the presence of Western and Christian culture, there has been a gradual but important recognition of the oblivion and discrimination in which these populations have lived together with the Amerindians. Some decades earlier, the Bishop of Buenaventua, Colombia, Gerardo Valencia Cano – recognised for his work among the Afro population of his diocese and in charge of the Missions Department of the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM) – in 1968 laid the foundations for a change in missionary pastoral practice, so that the Afro-descendant and Amerindian communities, as part of their Christian experience, would become the subjects of their own decisions, also giving them the tools to fight for their own rights. Although today they are recognised as having rights, structural racism is still anchored in the Western colonial institutions that continue to be the basis of the organisation not only of Latin American and Caribbean states but also of the Christian churches.

Effects of the Slave Trade

During the course of almost four centuries, from the 1500s until around 1880, the slave trade expeditions ploughed the Atlantic. As a result, 12–15 million African captives were deported to the Caribbean, North America and Latin America. These numbers do not include those who died during the crossing, whose deaths transformed the Atlantic into a graveyard. The African captives were to work as slaves on sugar cane, coffee, tobacco, cotton and indigo plantations, or in sugar production workshops, or as servants. The whole of Europe participated in this massive enterprise, which was fundamental to its economic development. Yet the memory of this event for a long time remained rather dim; then, between 1990 and 2000 there occurred a revival of this memory, which at long last was called a duty of remembrance.

Christianity historically has been interconnected with Haiti's social and political life and continues to be influential today. For instance, the influence of liberation theology predicated the fall of the Duvalier dictatorship and paved the way for the 1987 Constitution, founded on human rights and recognition of religious pluralism. In fact, Christianity has played such a strong socio-political role that it has not only impacted the very foundations of the country but continues to be influential in national and civic affairs, including at times of national crisis such as the earthquake disaster of 2010.

As a result of the voyage of Christopher Columbus, the island called Ayti by the Amerindians was transformed into Hispaniola, possession of Spain. The inhabitants, then known as Taínos, were enslaved and forcibly converted to Christianity. The Dominican religious Antonio Montesinos, followed by Bartolomé de Las Casas, argued for the defence of the Taínos against the mistreatment of the conquerors and opened an era of theological debates (in Valladolid) on the rights of the people to decide for themselves.

The French, through the West India Company in 1635, justified the enslavement of black Africans through the imposition of a Catholic baptism on all slaves and therefore their forced conversion. With the promulgation of the Black Code in 1685, in the context of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, both Protestant worship and African religious practices were prohibited. Paradoxically, the slaves showed exceptional enthusiasm for Catholic practices; the worship of saints was adapted to honour the African deities, leading to the birth of Vodou. This mixture of Catholic and Vodou practices gave Christianity in Haiti a particular form that lasts to this day. Many parishes remain important pilgrimage sites, attracting tens of thousands of faithful Catholics and Vodouists every year.

Having a different interpretation of Christianity, during the eighteenth century Vodou religious leaders organised resistance against slavery. In 1791, a general insurrection was conceived with the support of several priests. In 1804, following the military expedition of Napoleon to reinstitute slavery, Haiti became independent. The resulting Haitian authority, spurred by the presence of colonial slave powers surrounding the country, continued to recognise Catholicism as the official religion, in order to seek recognition from Rome, which was achieved only in 1860, after the signing of a concordat.