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Púlpito: An Introduction to Hispanic Preaching
Encounter, Summer 2006 by Allen, Ronald J
Púlpito: An Introduction to Hispanic Preaching. By Justo L. González and Pablo A. Jiménez. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2005. 140 pages.
This excellent book is not an introduction to preaching in the usual sense in which that notion is employed in Anglo-European circles. It does not purport to lay out a theological rationale for preaching before spending most of its pages on nuts-and-bolts approaches to sermons. Instead, the authors give less attention to the technical aspects of preaching and bring together historical retrospection, theological and cultural analysis, and representative sermons to provide a broad framework within which to understand preaching in the Hispanic Protestant tradition.
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The book opens with a fast-paced review of the three stages of the emergence of Hispanic preaching. The first, "transculturation," saw missionaries such as Spurgeon, Broadus, Blackwood, and Crane transplant approaches to sermons from the Anglo-European churches. During "inculturation," two popular indigenous styles emerged-the "reference/concordance sermon" and the testimonio-through Costas, Mottesi, and Arrastía. "Contextualization," the current emphasis, develops from a distinct analysis of the Hispanic situation from intertwining theological, political, economic, and social dimensions.
The authors identify issues that characterize many Hispanic contexts for preaching in the United States. These include the shape of Hispanic theology with its center in incarnation and scripture, the view that the text of the Bible interprets us, affirming the value of Hispanic culture, the social/political/economic reality of being marginalized, the persistent effects of being considered immigrants and feeling like exiles, and the difficulty of maintaining an identity in a setting in which the community is almost always bicultural and bilingual.
For bicultural and bilingual settings, Hispanic preachers approach the Bible in ways that honor the liberating core of the Bible, ways that call into question the present repressive social order and bring eschatological hope into the present. This approach is marked by four distinct characteristics: (1) the experience of marginalization is the point of entry into the text; (2) the preacher seeks points of contact between the social world of today's congregation and the biblical text; (3) the preacher correlates the social locations of the congregation in the text and in today's world; and (4) sermons are shaped around key metaphors for preaching, such as mestizaje. A brilliant study of the story of Mary and Martha in Luke illustrates this approach.
Sermons in Hispanic congregations can last from twenty to forty minutes and occur as part of community events that take place as often as three or four times a week. At many of these events, before the preacher even steps into the pulpit, lay people often give testimonies that border on the sermonic. Not only can this create a crisis of authority between congregations and their preachers, it also makes plain that ordination does not bestow authority in the way that it does in many Anglo-European Christian traditions. Hispanic congregations seek wisdom from the preacher-something that may come with education, but, many times, does not.
Ten engaging and insightful sermons from eight preachers (three women) from a range of texts illustrate how these perspectives come to expression in practice. Virgilio Elizondo's meditations on the Seven Last Words illustrate the prominence given to Holy Week and Good Friday in many Hispanic congregations.
Púlpito provides a basic orientation in English for Hispanic preachers. Under the spread of its wings, readers can develop more detailed understandings of how to preach in Hispanic settings. Furthermore, the book opens a larger window for scholars from the Anglo-European world (and other worlds as well) on the recent history and contemporary issues of preaching in the Hispanic community. This volume should become a standard entry in seminary preaching classes.
Ronald J. Allen
Christian Theological Seminary
Copyright Christian Theological Seminary Summer 2006
Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning Company. All rights Reserved
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