SEWING A NEW CLOTH:

A PROPOSAL FOR A PENTECOSTAL ECCLESIOLOGY FASHIONED AS A

COMMUNITY GIFTED BY THE SPIRIT WITH THE MARKS OF THE CHURCH
FROM A LATINA PERSPECTIVE

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A DISSERTATION
Submitted to the faculty of
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The Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago
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In partial Fulfillment
Of the requirement for the Degree of
Doctor of Philosophy

By

Agustina Luvis Nunez

May 2009
 UMI Number: 3353869

Copyright 2009 by
Luvis Nunez, Agustina

All rights reserved.

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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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My gratitude is to all those in whose company I have walked this challenging and
illuminating journey of theological studies.
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Thanks for stand besides me upon my path and held out a hand when I stumbled.

I appreciate the solidarity and care of each of these people, who were willing to open
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doors and helped me to see my dreams come true.
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 ABSTRACT

Sewing a New Cloth: A Proposal for a Pentecostal Ecclesiology Fashioned as a

Community Gifted by the Spirit with the Marks of the Church from a Latina
Perspective

By: Agustina Luvis Nunez

Advisor: Dr. Jose David Rodriguez

The core of this research is the articulation of an ecclesiological proposal

from Puerto Rican women perspective.
The Ariadne's thread of this dissertation is the Pentecostal women

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challenging and revisiting, again and again, the so called "Pentecostal gender
paradox," until gender justice is achieved.
Pentecostalism as a Christian movement has not attempted to develop a
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theology of the church. However from that does not follow the absence of such
doctrine. Pentecostals conceive the church as a community gifted by the Spirit to
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proclaim God's good news in Jesus Christ, to the whole world.
In spite of the fact that, quantitatively speaking, women represent the vast
majority of the Pentecostal membership, women have been systemically
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excluded from the decision making process of defining the very nature of the
church. Therefore, the kairos has come to stop invisibilizing and silencing
women's voice, and instead of that, to start thinking and walking, hand in hand,
men and women, en conjunto (in togetherness), in order to built a democratic
church.
By reclaiming the ecumenical Nicene Creed and particularly its
traditional "Marks of the church": One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic,
alternative visions of being church will become apparent. In doing that, the
dialogue has been broadened to include female interlocutors who talk the talk in
the academia and walk the walk in the congregations.
This study proposes that the gifts of the Spirit are signs of the church as
well. The concept of the notes of the church is not a common one among the

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Pentecostal tradition; nevertheless this notion is a very useful theological key
from which we can depart in order to articulate an ecclesiology that pretends to
be ecumenical. In addition, the gifts of the Spirit alongside with the marks of the
church will enrich the different denominations within Christianity.
Methodologically, this research approaches the topic of "Notes towards a
Puerto Rican Pentecostal Ecclesiology" from the theological and ethnographical
angles. It highlights the contributions of Caribbean Pentecostal women and at the
same time invites to the discussion table Hispanic and non Hispanic feminists
who have already made relevant contributions to the doctrine of ecclesiology. As
a result of this dialogue with several partners, notes towards a Puerto Rican
Pentecostal ecclesiology have been ventured.

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The study concludes asserting that there is continuity with the
affirmation that the gifts of the Spirit are marks of the church as the traditional
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notae. Such declaration is based on the truth that both approaches are oriented to
praxis of love to our neighbor and consequently, the result will be a more
inclusive, ecumenical, ecological, contextual, healing, and liberating community,
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which is in the last analysis, a definition of what a community of the Spirit stands
for.
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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Copyrights ii
Acknowledgements in
Abstract iv

Introduction 1
Methodology 7
Design 10
Participants 11

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Chapter 1 IE
Pentecostal Ecclesiology 17
Pentecostalism's Historical Background 18
Hispanic Presence 25
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Hispanic Pentecostalism's Origins 26
Women's Role in This "His"-tory 32
Pentecostal Contributions in the Area of Ecclesiology 39
Hispanic Pentecostal Contribution 52
Pentecostal Church Strengths 57
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Pentecostal Church's Challenges 60

Chapter 2
Feminist Ecclesiology 64
Christian Feminist Voices in Ecclesiology 65
Feminist Theological Anthropology: The Starting Point 82
A Little of History 84
Pentecostal Women and Gender Issues 92
Spirituality: A Point of Encounter 97
Elements of Feminist Spirituality 104
An Assessment of these various Insights in Pentecostalism and
Feminist Spirituality 113
Chapter 3
Latina Ecclesiology-State of the Question 120
Hispanic/Latina Theology Developments 121
Latina Feminist and Mujerista Theology 130
Other Voices in Hispanic/Latina Theology 135
Marks of the Church 138

Chapter 4
Pentecostal Latina Women's Voices:
A Puerto Rican Perspective 148

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Caribbean Theology 157
Latina Pentecostal Women's Voices 168
Articulating Our Ecclesiology 179
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Conclusions 183

Selected Bibliography 190

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Appendix
A 203
B 204
 Al viento delEspiritu que se llevo,
en Pentecostes, los prejuicios,
los interesesy el miedo de los apostolus
y abrio de par en par laspuertas del cendculo,
para que la comunidad de los seguidores de Jesus
fuera siempre abierta al mundo
y litre en su palabra
y coherente en su testimonio
e invencible en su esperanza.
Al viento de su Espiritu
que se Ileva siempre los nuevos miedos de la Iglesia
Pedro Casaldaliga1

INTRODUCTION

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My thesis is that Pentecostal women in the past and in the present continue to

challenge the "Pentecostal gender paradox,"2 namely that even when women are
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seldom allowed to become pastors and there are usually restrictions on their
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participation in the leadership of the ministry of the Word, as well as strict regulation

controlling dress and bodily adornment. However, from that does not follow that

women are mere spectators. No. Women are especially favored with spiritual gifts in
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a movement which is after all, expressly constituted around the gifts of the Spirit.

Consequently, Pentecostal women are able to articulate an alternative form of being

[To the Spirit's wind which took awayJ in Pentecost, prejudices,/ the Apostles' interests
andfears,/ and wide opened the dinning room doors,/ so that Jesus' community of followers/ were
always open to the world/ andfree in their word/ and coherent in their witnessing/ and unbeatable in
their hope./ To the Spirit's wind/ which always takes away the new fears of the church. ] Pedro
Casaldaliga, Fuego y Ceniza Al Viento (Brasil: Mato Grosso, 1983), 1.
2
This phenomenon is described by some analysts as the "Pentecostal gender paradox":
Starting with Elizabeth Brusco's pioneering study- research on Pentecostals in the developing world,
has repeatedly found that women are advantaged in new and crucial ways by the movement. See
Elizabeth Brusco,'The Reformation of Machismo: Ascetism and Masculinity among Colombian
Evangelicals," in Rethinking Protestantism in Latin America, eds. Virginia Garrard-Burnett and
David Stoll (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1994): 143-158.

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church that follows the traditional "marks of the church" as well as the note of being a

community gifted by the Spirit.

Pentecostalism as a religious movement was born and emerged as a dynamic

renewal within Christianity at the beginnings of the twentieth century. People who

participate in this renewal share an emphasis on life in the Spirit, subjective religious

experience and spiritual gifts, miracles, signs and wonders -including a language of

experiential spirituality rather than of theology - while strictly rational, scientific and

theological reflection is not its main focus.

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Veli-Matti Karkkainen argues that this form of being church opposes the

traditional concept of the church, that sometimes forces us to choose between being a
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free or an historical church. This alternative way of being church confronts us to

participate of a charismatic experience or of a more elaborated liturgical experience;

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to focus on practice or on reflection; to have oral and narrative patterns of

theologizing or discursive modes of theological reflection, and so on.3 In my

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estimation, far from forcing us to decide between one and another mode of being

church, Pentecostal ecclesiology is an invitation to the "catholic" church to recognize

that there are different understandings of faith exist in new expressions in life and

result in diverse forms of being church.

Some Pentecostal scholars agree that Pentecostalism has not attempted to

develop a distinctive ecclesiology, a theology of the Church, even though

Pentecostals conceive of themselves as a community of faith, gifted by the Spirit, and

that the proliferation of Pentecostal church bodies emerges from practical rather than

3
Veli-Matti Karkkainen, An Introduction to Ecclesiology: Ecumenical, Historical and
Global Perspectives (Downers Grove: Intervarsity Press, 2002).
 3

out of theological necessity.4 In general, Pentecostals have written little on

ecclesiology.5 Despite this fact some theologians question this absolute affirmation.

In the case of the Church of God, a classical Pentecostal church, for example, there is

an extensive debate about the nature and purpose of the Church within its early

history.6

Nevertheless, this lack of an articulated ecclesiology is more meaningful

within the Hispanic7 Pentecostal Church. According to Justo Gonzalez, some relevant

factors may explain why the Protestant Hispanics in general have inherited a theology

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in which ecclesiology does not play a primary role. First is the fact that Hispanics

have received a Protestantism centered on personal salvation with a strong emphasis

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on the individual's faith rather than on the faith of the community. Second, it was an

anti-catholic Protestantism and therefore anti-church in its teachings. Third, it was an

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anti-liberalism one, reinforcing the authority of the individual to examine the Bible

while denying the need of the church for salvation. Fourth, it was an anti-hierarchical
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Protestantism in which the Church was considered an external entity apart from its

4
Frank Macchia, "Theology, Pentecostal," in International Dictionary of Pentecostals and
Charismatic Movements, ed. Stanley Burgess and Eduard Van Der Maas (Grand Rapids: Zondervan,
2002), 1137.
5
This lack of written reflections has been explained due to the strong oral and testimonial
tradition of Pentecostals and to the Pentecostal emphasis on being more "doers" than "thinkers" of
their faith and community life as well. Nevertheless, any study of the Pentecostal contribution to
ecclesiology must take into consideration the writings of Donald Gee, specifically his editorials in
Pentecost from 1947-1966; the work of John Lancaster, The Spirit-Filled Church (Springfield, MO:
Gospel Publishing House, 1987). W.G. Hathaway, The Gifts of the Spirit in the Church, 1963; R.P
Splitter, The Church, 1977; and the recent work of Miroslav Volf, After Our Likeness: The Church
as The Image of the Trinity (Grand Rapids, MI: WB Eerdmans Publishing Co. 1998).
6
Dale M. Counter, "The Development of Ecclesiology in the Church of God (Cleveland,
TN): A Forgotten Contribution?" Pneuma: The Journal of the Society for Pentecostal Studies
29(2007): 59-83.
7
1 will use interchangeably both terms Hispanic and Latino.
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people. Fifth, and specifically in the Pentecostal Church the emphasis on the freedom

of the Spirit represented a discontinuity from ecclesiastical constraints or precedents.8

In my view, this lack of written reflection on ecclesiology has to do with the

fact that Pentecostalism is not a monolithic movement. There are many categories of

Pentecostalism around the world,9 resulting in an array of communities of faith that

understand themselves affirming distinctive ways of being church. I will limit my

work to the native and indigenous Pentecostalism, which emerges from particular

Hispanic context.

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The intention of my study is to suggest a Pentecostal ecclesiology from the

perspective of Hispanic women. In my experience, Pentecostal women constitute the

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majority in the Pentecostal Church, yet, in my estimation they are do not the ones that

make the greatest contribution in defining the nature of the Christian community.
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Long back, Simone de Beauvoir, a pioneer reflecting from a women's perspective

argued that "representation of the world, like the world itself, is the work of men;
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they describe it from their own point of view, which they confuse with absolute

truth."10 I would add that reflection on the topic of the church is also the work of

men, specifically in the Pentecostal context, even though history reveals that since the

beginning of the movement women were not bystanders or merely supporters. On the

contrary, they were committed and involved in every facet of ministry, despite

Justo Gonzalez, "In Quest of a Protestant Ecclesiology," In Teologla de Conjunto: A

Collaborative Hispanic Protestant Theology, eds. Jose David Rodriguez, Loida Martell-Otero
(Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 1997), 80-82.
9
The International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements identifies at least
95 categories.
10
Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, trans. H.M. Parshley (New York: Vintage, 1972),
161.
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restrictions that had found their way into the Pentecostal movement in its earliest

stages.11

In other Christian traditions women have challenged this lack of reflection

developing alternative visions of being church that are consistent with the debate

regarding the traditional "marks of the Church."12 In addition, in their perspective,

the Church is enabled by the Spirit for the transformation of the existing church and

society structures.13

My contribution to the discussion table, has to do with a concept that

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considers the church as the "gifted community" where the gifts of the Spirit could be

considered as marks of the Church. My aim is to propose a more inclusive,

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ecumenical, ecological, contextual, healing and transformative community, which is

in the last analysis my definition of what a "community of the Spirit," stands for.
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To be sure, the idea of "marks of the church" is not a common one among

Pentecostal religious leaders. However, I consider this notion as a theological key

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from which we depart to articulate an ecclesiology that pretends to be ecumenical. An

important goal in my examination of this topic is to explore the way these "marks of

the church" present themselves within the context of the "charismata" of the Spirit in

the Pentecostal tradition. In this way, my intention is to contribute a Pentecostal

perspective that aims at a theological articulation of the church from a female

perspective in the context of Puerto Rican society. This enterprise would increase

11
Estrelda Alexander, The Women ofAzusa Street ( Cleveland, Ohio: Pilgrim Press
Publishing Co., 2005).
12
1 am referring to the traditional marks of the Church: Unity, Holiness, Catholicity and
Apostolicity articulated in the Nicene Creed.
13
Among them: Letty Russell, Rosemary Radford Ruether, Elizabeth Schussler Fiorenza,
and Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz.
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awareness of being part of the larger Christian tradition, which is lacking among the

majority of Pentecostal churches. Equally important, such reflections would open

built the door to ecumenical and macro-ecumenical dialogue.

Finally, this project will contribute to a broader understanding of the

ecclesiological debate by highlighting the role of the gifts of the Spirit for

understanding of the Christian community.

The following section will be devoted to the methodological issues of my

research. The first chapter consists of an exploration of Pentecostal ecclesiology,

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taking into consideration the contributions of Pentecostal voices of the academia,

their diversity of perspectives, emphases and limitations. The second chapter will
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focus on the feminist debates about reconstructions or conceptualizations of the

church, their theological methods, critical theories and suggestions for a constructive
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transformation in the Church. Given the fact that "theological reflection works out of
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specific contexts rather than working with generic truths," chapter four will give
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attention to the work of Hispanic/Latino theologians. Here the interlocutors will be

primarily from my cultural, social and geographic context. Finally, in the last chapter

I will analyze a number of interviews performed within the Hispanic Pentecostal

female population joined to my ecclesiological proposal. In the conclusion I will

venture to articulate the relevant features of a proposal for a Pentecostal Puerto Rican

ecclesiology.

14
Robert Kinast, What Are They Saying about Theological Reflection? (New
York/Mahwah, N.J.:Paulist Press, 2000), 1.
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Methodology

The methodology that will guide me in this research is an interdisciplinary

one, incorporating historical, theological and semi-structure15 and ethnographic

interview's approaches.16 First I will explore historically and theologically the

contribution of Pentecostal theologians and historians to the discussion about the

doctrine of the church.

Second, my approach will be directed to research the work of Christian

women in the arena of ecclesiology, analyzing their proposals and reflecting on its

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possibilities for a Hispanic Pentecostal ecclesiological proposal from women

perspective. Third, I will incorporate the cultural and ethnic dimension, grasping the
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work of Hispanic theologians and historians in the theme of ecclesiology.
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The historical and theological method will also help me to retrieve what the

Pentecostal church might learn from its Hispanic female population, not only

analyzing their limited documented contribution, but by listening to the voices of

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ordinary Pentecostal women and their experiences. For this purpose, I will conduct

interviews. 17

These interviews will be guided by ethnographic principles. Ethnography is a

way of conducting research based on "the complex relationships between the

15
Semi-structured interviews are conducted with a fairly open framework which allow for
focused, conversational communication. They can be used both to give and receive information. Not
all questions are designed and phrased ahead of time. Some of questions are created during the
interview, allowing both the interviewer and the person being interviewed the flexibility to probe for
details or discuss issues. See Jim McMillan and Sally Schumacher, Research in Education: Evidence
Based Inquiry, 6th ed. (Lebanon, Indiana: Addison-Wesley, 2005).
16
.Even when I did not work immersed inside a specific culture other than my own, I
decided to be guided by ethnographic principles based on the fact that this methodology allow me to
present these women insights with the less mediation possible.
17
See Appendix A for the interview model.
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researcher and his [sic] informants."18 To recover the voices and reflections of

women within the Pentecostal church, I will conduct these interviews through

conversation and dialogue as well as explore the contribution of women within the

Pentecostal Church and their vision of the church.

Through these interviews, women will express their thoughts and visions of

what it means for them to be a church and how they articulate the activities of the

church in terms of: the proclamation of God's news (kerigma), the work of the people

as praise and worship of God (leitourgia), the self-giving of the church in service to

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those in need (diakonia) and the fellowship of the church that welcomes all

(koinonia)19 They will be asked to reflect on the role of a pneumatological dimension

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in the theology of the church in their own understanding and how to define the role of

the gifts of the Spirit in the church today.

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According to Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz,20 the goal of ethnographic interviews is

"to learn from people, to be taught by them." They also make it possible to hear many
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voices instead of only the voices of the leaders of the community.

18
James P. Spradley, The Ethnographic Interview (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
1979), 4.
19
The Pentecostal tradition is characterized by the predominant place that occupy orality in
their articulation of their faith, specifically in worship, through preaching, testimony, songs and so
on. But also for their capacity to serve, where other Christian traditions are not present and for the
weight of communal affection. For this reason diakonia, leitourgia, koinonia and kerigma are
relevant when Pentecostals try to explain their concept of church. These features have their
background in the biblical testimony of Acts that describes the beginnings of the church. (Acts 2:44-
47).
20
Isasi-Diaz is an exponent of Mujerista theology, which is described by her as a liberative
praxis-reflective action that has as it goals the liberation of Hispanic women. This theology brings
together feminist theology, cultural theology and liberation theology. Isasi-Diaz utilizes the
ethnography and meta-ethnography as two qualitative research methods to gather the voices and
lived experience of Hispanic women and to elaborate mujerista theology.
21
Ada Maria Isasi Diaz, En la Lucha: Elaborating a Mujerista Theology (Minneapolis:
Fortress Press, 1993), 66.
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The ethnographic approach has emerged with a new appreciation among

educators, urban planners, sociologists, health workers, psychologists, politicians, and

also theologians. When we talk about what it means to be church for women it is

necessary to listen to them and to observe them, but also to allow them to become our

teachers. The ethnography22 is a qualitative tool that allows the researcher to see

through the eyes of the one being researched. In other words, this methodology

allows the evangelist, to be evangelized as well.

One of the most important criteria for doing ethnography is to acknowledge

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that knowledge of all cultures is valuable.23 This acknowledgement has been

increasingly important in theology in recent years. Many of today definitions of

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theology consider Christian on the gospel in light of their own circumstances, but also

reflection of life in the light of their faith.24 I argue that the voices of Pentecostal
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Hispanic women need to be present in the theological discourse that articulates what

it means to be church today, and that they need to be considered equally valid with
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the dominant voices. Taking the voices of women into consideration, part of my

method consists in performing interviews that will give us knowledge of how

Hispanic Pentecostal women understand the church and its mission, to document the

existence of a concrete reality and to describe this reality in its own terms.

According to specialists on ethnography one of the particularities of this

method of doing research is the role of participants. Usually, these participants are

understood as subjects who are studied to confirm or contest a specific hypothesis.

22
Ethnography has been defined as " the work of describing a culture," which essential core
is the concern with the meaning of actions and events to the people we seek to understand. See James
P. Spradley, The Ethnographic Interview (USA: Wadsworth, 1979).
23
Ibid., 10
24
Clodovis Boff, Teoria delmetodo teologico (Mexico, D.F.: Ediciones Dabar, 2001).
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Participants in ethnographic research are called informants, those researchers

approach with naive ignorance. I prefer to call them colleagues. My study is an effort

to describe and propose what it means to be the church from the perspective of

Pentecostal Hispanic women. Toward that aim, and contrary to responses to a survey

questionnaire, the language used to formulate questions in this method, is the

language of the interviewed, the language of Pentecostal Hispanic women.

As well as any other methodology, the ethnographic approach has its

weaknesses. Robert Schreiter reminds us that, first; the development of a contextual

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local theology is often set out as a project and not carried beyond the first couple of

steps. The questions are addressed to the Christian faith but there is no time to
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continue the dialogue. Second, due to concerns on identity, the ethnographic approach

can often overlook conflictive factors for the sake of maintaining harmony and peace
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in the community. There also exists the possibility to fall into a type of cultural

romanticism, leading to inability to see people own shortcomings and the sins of their
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historical experience. Finally, much of this analysis can be done by experts, while

excluding the communities themselves.25

Design

My research to the theological literature reveals that there has only been

modest theological work done by Pentecostals on ecclesiology, and all the work that

has been done by male theologians, who address questions that are of interest to this

population. For this reason my study can be classified as exploratory. This study

25
Robert Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books,
1999), 14.
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intends to be a departing point for other works in this area. The focus will be

interdisciplinary, including the analysis of readings or documental research along

with the interview. This interdisciplinary methodology will allow me to hear the

voices of history but also to give voice to the ones that have never been heard.

Participants

The constitution of the sample was as follows: 10 Hispanic Pentecostal

women between 21 and 66 years old. These women are active member of various

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Hispanic Pentecostal Churches: classical, charismatic, native, or neo-

Pentecostal.29 Some are laywomen, pastors, teachers, missionaries, or evangelists,

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but all of them are or have been deeply involved in the Pentecostal Church.

Every interview started with a greeting and word of appreciation for the
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collaboration in this work. I informed each participant about my research, its aims,

objectives and methodology. I also communicated with them individually about my

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responsibility to safeguard their rights, interests, and sensitivities. All agreed to have

the protection of saying things "off the record" and to decide what they did not want

Classical Pentecostals refers to those who trace their Pentecostal origins to a revival that
began on January 1st, 1901 at Charles F. Parham's Bethel Bible School in Topeka, Kansas and
William J. Seymour, a black Holiness preacher and the "outpouring of the Holy Spirit" started at
Azusa St. in Los Angeles, California on 1906, which initial evidence is speaking in tongues.
27
Charismatic refers to those Pentecostals that emerge from the Charismatic renewal
movement in the Roman Catholic Church in 1967 and other renewal transdenominational movements
among Protestants who emphasize a "life in the Spirit" and the importance of exercising
extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, including but not limited to glossolalia.
28
Native Pentecostals refers to those indigenous Pentecostal churches that grow from native
initiatives and share the emphasis in the Holy Spirit and the exercise of the gifts of the Spirit.
29
Neopentecostals is a catch-all category that comprises around 19.000 independent, non-
denominational, post denominational denominations and groups that cannot be classified as either
classic Pentecostal or charismatic but share a common emphasis on spiritual gifts, the Holy Spirit and
Pentecostal-like experiences, signs and wonders and power encounters. (See the New Dictionary of
Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements, xx)
 12

to appear in my notes. They agreed also to remain anonymous and receive no

compensation.30

I gave them a detailed explanation about the interview, how the questions

were going to be asked, and the language expected to be used and answered any

questions about the interview.

As Spradley recommends,31 at every stage of the interview I expressed

interest in the participant's answers, and at the same time expressed a kind of "naive

ignorance," to make them feel open and collaborative. Sometimes I repeated what

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they expressed, and restated the participant's terms, incorporating them. The

interview atmosphere was a friendly one. These interviews are much more a
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conversation, a dialogue. As Spradley describes it, in this method, "the goal is to learn

from the people, to be taught by them."32 It is through their experience that the
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researcher can grasp what they believe and how their beliefs impact their daily life.

The interviews were conducted in the setting of the women's specific churches, at
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their homes or any other place convenient for them.

In the course of its development, Christian theology has undergone a number

of shifts in perspective with regard to what theology is and what theologians talk

about. The Enlightenment place human beings and their experience on the intellectual

agenda, meaning that theology could no longer be understood as an abstract and

"objective" science, but had to account adequate for its "subjective" dimension. This

aperture to a new epistemology joined to an emphasis now upon context and the role

See Appendix B for the Consent Document.

Spradley, 67.
Ibid., 66
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of communal experience in theological reflection created the space to hear the voices

of those who had been silenced.

Doing theology has to do with the lived experience of people. For this reason,

these interviews intend to look more closely at the life and experience of these

women and to take into consideration what has been overlooked for many years,

particularly their understanding of what the church must be. Today, the dominant

understandings and practices considered significant arise from the experience of men

in the Church. As Isasi-Diaz points out, "by using the lived experience of women as

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the source of theological reflection, gives us the opportunity to be self-defining, to

give fresh answers, and, what is most important, to ask new questions."33 Vitor
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Westhelle affirms that "justice begins here; it begins not in fulfilling the requirements

of the prevailing regimes, but by setting other conditions, other parameters."34 In the
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last decades, women studies have undergone many changes that had an impact on the

feminist methodology and epistemology. The women's experience has become the
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source and scientific, theoric and empirical starting point.

I was born and grew up in a Pentecostal church. This background allowed me

to be in contact with women of faith who spend much of their lives working, serving,

worshipping and being deeply involved in the life of the church. All of the

participants in this study are known to me and had the confidence and the openness to

dialogue with me.

Isasi-Diaz, En la Lucha, 73.

34
Vitor Westhelle, "The Word and the Mask: Revisiting the Two-Kingdoms Doctrine," in
The Gift of Grace: The Future of Lutheran Theology, eds. Neils Henrik Gregersen et al.
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005), 178.
 14

To choose the participating colleagues in my research, first I identified Puerto

Rican Pentecostal women from different backgrounds, age, social status, and so on.

Then, I wrote down, their specific characteristics to be sure that the sample would be

the most representative as possible. The next step was to make appointments and to

proceed with the interview. I made written notes of their answers and their questions

as well, being conscious not to translating what they expressed. I used the insights of

these women to articulate a conception of being church that is born from their

experience.

W
In the opinion of many analysts, Pentecostalism is an expression of the

popular religion of the marginalized communities. Orlando Espin,35 who has worked
IE
on popular Catholicism, has identified this religious expression as one of the most

distinctive elements of Latino culture and an essential dimension of any project of

EV
Latino Theology. He argues that the popular understanding of Christianity has a

history in the medieval age, in the pre- reformation Spanish Christianity and the pre-
PR

Tridentine ages. In the Hispanic community it has been a response to the imposition

of beliefs of the hierarchical and patriarchal church, which in the name of God and in

the name of the evangelization of the New World tried to eradicate any sign of the

indigenous native people and through a dehumanizing process of colonization,

kidnapped African people from their homelands to use them as instruments of forced

labor while submitting them to a process of deculturation. A popular interpretation of

Christianity came into being when native indigenous people and enslaved African

people adopted Christianity in a native and African way. Espin points out that popular

35
Orlando Espin and Roberto S. Goizueta, The Faith of the People: Theological Reflections
on Popular Catholicism (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1997).
 15

religion is popular because is one created, practiced and lived by the marginalized

people.

Contrary to the traditional and "official" understanding of Christianity that

considers popular religion as a problem, as an exotic, eccentric, voiceless and

irrelevant one, in a Hispanic/Latino theological articulation, popular religion is taken

seriously as a locus theologians. Hispanic popular religion is a source of hope in the

struggle. Their fiestas, celebrations, family concept, community, and prayers give

people the strength, faith and hope to their daily struggles and also help them to voice

W
and to act their own spirituality. Sometimes it represents the only vehicle available for

them to express their understanding of themselves, the world or the Divine. Espin
IE
affirms that Hispanic popular religion has theological significance, pastoral

importance as well as cultural relevance.36

EV
Hispanic Pentecostalism as well as Popular Catholicism represents an

alternative religious response for the Hispanic community. Even while Latino
PR

Pentecostalism rejects many medieval and colonial Catholic symbols and practices, it

has managed to hold on to the very "sacramental," symbolic ethos and worldview that

made pre-Reformation Christianity possible.37 Espin argues that the ever-increasing

number of Protestant Pentecostal churches as well as the current popularity of

Catholic Charismatic movements among U.S. Latinos has to do with the crucial role

of cultural and religious preservation that the Pentecostal movement is playing.

Therefore, my intention is to provide a platform for the voices of Pentecostal

Orlando Espin, The Faith of the People: Theological Reflections on Popular Catholicism
(Maiyknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1997).
 16

Hispanic women, in order to allow them to elaborate their own ecclesiological

reflection.

W
IE
EV
PR