Several years ago I had the great honor of meeting and learning from indigenous pastoral leaders and community organizers of San Cristóbal de Las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico. For 500 years, Chiapas has been ground zero for European and Euro-American colonial and neo-colonial efforts, and to this day it is known as the most indigenous state of Mexico, with the highest rates of poverty, environmental pollution, and racial inequality. Perhaps not surprisingly, Chiapas is the birthplace of the Zapatistas, and was also notably the home of both Bartolomé de Las Casas and Bishop Samuel Ruiz, two of the most important advocates of the Brown Church over the past five centuries.
I’ll never forget visiting a Zapatista “caracol,” or community of resistance. This was such an honor for me because very few outsiders have ever seen the inside of a caracol because entrance is by invitation only. Our close friend Pastora Gloria, recognized as one of the leading indigenous activists of the city, gave us a tour.
The caracol which we visited was a job training center and originally founded by Bishop Samuel Ruiz. Ruiz was a noted liberation theologian pastor who negotiated the peace settlement between the Zapatistas and the Mexican government, and who to this day is revered by all as “Jtatik Samuel,” or “father Samuel,” in the Mayan dialect of Tseltal. In this caracol one could train to be a carpenter, beautician, artist, or textile weaver. A seminary was even housed on the grounds, and this seminary was a popular stop during the flourishing years of the liberation theology movement.
What stood out to me most was our visit to the workshop of a master textile weaver, Hector. Hector was a master of colorful handwoven Mayan textiles and had been honing his artistic craft for sixty years. Day after day, hour by hour, for sixty years, he was devoted to his art. Hector exudes inspiration. Every item he produces is one of a kind. He built all of his own equipment and looms with wood and string. And instead of choosing to become rich by selling his high-quality products in a wealthy gallery in Mexico City or exporting to curious customers in the United States or Europe, everything he makes goes to local Mayan communities.
Hector’s workshop runs on an apprenticeship model. He is a teacher who has chosen to pass on his knowledge, one student at a time. Surprisingly, when we visited, he had only one or two students. That day, these students were tasked with a single repetitive task, far removed from the loom itself. I would have expected such a master to have students lining up to overflowing outside the door. Instead, I imagine, Hector chose those two students because they were humble and eager to learn, truly committed to the years of hard, and often unglorious, work ahead. They had counted the extravagant but worthwhile cost of discipleship. Perhaps the commitment to be a disciple of Hector was just too much for most people. Why not just produce machine manufactured knock offs for tourists at a much cheaper price with much less effort and higher profit? Why devote decades to becoming a master artisan committed to ancient techniques and hand-made dyes only to live in simplicity?
This example reminds me of the development of Brown Theology in the United States and Latin America over the past fifty years. Largely out of the limelight of the mainstream workshops and publication houses of the theological and religious studies academy, and uninvited to fancy conferences and speaking circuits, Latina/o theologians-- Protestant and Catholic (and even a few Orthodox)--have labored and sacrificed all to untie the jangled knots of White Christian Nationalism from the original Christian faith established by Jesus Christ, the apostles, and the early church. Most also labored in small churches, proximate to the pain of the people. Like Hector, day after day, hour by hour, often without recognition or remuneration, they labored for their community. To borrow an expression which theologians use to describe the mother of Jesus, they have been the “untier of knots.” But they haven’t just stopped there, as important as that task may be.
As master weavers, Samuel Escobar, Justo González, Gustavo Gutiérrez, Maria Pilar Aquino, Orlando Costas, Elsa Tamez, Samuel Escobar, Elizabeth Conde-Frazier, Loida Martell-Otero, Edwin Aponte, Juan Martinez, Oscar Garcia-Johnson, Ruth Padilla-DeBorst, Daniel Carroll, and many others, have woven colorful and sturdy “hilos,” or threads, of Bible, history, and theology, into a beautiful, healing, and consoling pastoral “cobija” of Brown Theology. This book focuses upon Latina/o theological master weavers, whose writings have proven the test of time.
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This book represents a theological cobija, or quilt, in five parts:
Chapter One: Teología en Conjunto
Drawing upon the Latina/o theology concept of "teología en conjunto" with Justo Gonzalez and Samuel Escobar as theological and missiological guides, chapter one explores a framework and process of communal theological discernment for our changing times. According to Latina/o theologians, theology is a communal endeavor. Theology is too sacred, and too much is on the line to rely upon the judgment of any single human being’s perspective as definitive for the entire Church. Such theological and pastoral individualism with neither fidelity nor accountability to the historic theological tradition of 2,000 years of global Christianity is what has gotten us into this mess. There is of course a role for individual reflection and biblical rumination, but the model of a learned monk in a medieval castle (or a 19th century German professor with a goat-tee)(or a lone southern pastor proclaiming to his megachurch that God hates immigrants and the LGBTQ community) prognosticating profound theological insights for all to follow can lead to many dangers. In modeling theological discernment for the earliest church, the Jerusalem Council stated, “It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us.” Jesus’ brother James would also say, “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters, for you know that we who teach will face stricter judgment.” James 3:1
Drawing from the Latina/o theology model of Teología en Conjunto and missiological literature, I propose the following model of theological and cultural discernment.
Teología en Conjunto
Cultural discernment in theological matters is best done in the context of:
1. Community: the local and global church, intergenerational, intercultural, gender equality, cross-socioeconomic.
2. Worship in the Holy Spirit: “lex orandi, lex credendi,” or “the law of prayer is the law of belief.” Theology flows from worship.
3. Scripture: The Scriptures are the inspired Word of God and guide for life, and personal and social transformation (2 Timothy 3: 16-17; 2 Peter 1: 20-21; Psalm 119: 105). The Bible is a treasure, and God meets us, and speaks to us, through it (Matthew 13:52; Hebrews 4:12; Psalm 119: 72, 81, 98 ). It is sweeter than honey to the taste, and it brings peace, hope and wisdom (Psalm 119: 103, 130, 165). Social and political doctrines may change with time, but God’s Word remains our authority (Matthew 24:35).
4. History and Tradition: 2,000 year history of the global church, including its successes and failures. Christianity is a generational process (Walls and Escobar) and has always been polycentric, with shifting geographical centers. The Great Tradition supplies the theological foundations for successive generations of theological development (Oden, Bediako, Alvarez). Heresy forces the clarification of orthodoxy and each generation of the Church builds upon the next with insights intended for the growth and maturity of the entire Body of Christ. Discernment is critical to distinguish between faithful development and heresy (Newman). Brown Theology and emerging theologies of the Global South are Spirit-led developments intended for the growth and healing of the Church universal.
5. Sub-principles:
Harmony: 2,000 year “constants.” As Justo Gonzalez has described, doctrine is like the foul lines of a baseball field which allow for diversity and variation, yet bounded by sufficient rules to prevent the game from devolving into chaos.
Openness: to critique and conversation.
Law of Love (Augustine): drawn closer to Christ and love of neighbor.
For profound moral and cultural issues, communal discernment by diverse members of the local and global church is necessary. As previously stated, too often, theological discernment in the US is done in an individualistic manner or as the province and domain of a single denomination at best. Also, whether liberal or conservative, theological reflection in the US is done from a culturally monolithic white lens. The voices of those where the global Church is actually thriving are categorically excluded, whether that be voices of the immigrant, Native, and Black churches in the US, or the rising churches of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The voices of women leaders is usually omitted. Young voices are left out, as are poor voices–the voices of the “Galillees” of our day.
When Christ enters a new cultural group, He addresses their questions which are raised in their own language, cultural context, and cultural categories (Walls, Bediako, Escobar). They learn to read the Bible with their own, new eyes. This process of Gospel incarnation leads to new discoveries about Christ which benefit the entire Body of Christ. With each new discovery, the Body of Christ grows one step closer to maturity. “The Body of Christ grows an inch.” This is the gift of Brown Theology and global theology in general.
Chapter Two: “The Glory and Honor of the Nations”: A Theology of Community Cultural Wealth
Drawing upon this approach of theological discernment, Chapter two explores a Brown Theology of community cultural wealth, grounded in Revelation 21:26-27. As reflected in Justo Gonzalez’s framework of Culto,Cultura y Cultivo, worship, culture, and work are all interconnected, and our respective ethnic cultures were always part of God’s plan. This chapter argues that God redeems and refashions all of our ethnic cultures for His glory. According to David, we, as image bearers of God, are “crowned with glory and honor” (Psalm 8:6). Our rich, God-given ethnic cultural treasure and wealth is a critical and often-forgotten aspect of this glory and honor (Revelation 21: 26). At the same time, however, all of our ethnic cultures have distinct sin which mars the reflection of the image of God in us and our communities (Revelation 21:27). That’s why we all need Jesus. Jesus redeems us as individuals, but also as cultural communities who surrender to his healing and renewal.
If our respective ethnic cultures are part of God’s plan, possess glory and honor, but also sin, then what happens when a person comes to know Jesus? What is the relationship between salvation and that person’s inherited culture? Does it all just get thrown away?
As exemplified by the writings of Samuel Escobar, Orlando Costas, and Justo Gonzalez, such questions of faith and cultural identity are not new to second generation Latino millennials and GenZ in the US. Similar questions were asked not only by Latin American theologians of FTL in the 1970’s and 80’s, but even by the earliest Christians.
As for the early church, Escobar writes: “As time went on new churches were planted and new cities reached, and ensuing generations of leaders such as Irenaeus, Tertullian, Origen and Clement of Alexandria became the apologists who expounded the Gospel for the new generations of believers. Their literary work made the Christian faith a valid alternative for young minds in search of wisdom.”
For example, in the second century Origen asked:
What value was there in Greek cultural identity?
What was the relationship between the Greek past and the Gospel?
To make this point, Irenaeus, Origen, and Augustine all reflected upon the Tabernacle and Exodus 35. They asked: where did the Israelites get the gold, silver, crimson yarn, and fine linen to build the Tabernacle in the desert?
Their answer: from the Egyptians. And from this example we see that God redeems and refashions our ethnic cultures for His glory.
But Escobar warns: “ Love for our own culture and language to the point of making them sacred and turning them into idols is a trap to be avoided by all. The God of Abraham and of Jesus Christ is not…a local totem who wants to favor one clan for its own sake, but the Creator of human kind and wants to bless all peoples within this human family.”
This is similar to today, where many U.S. Latinos are asking: What is the relationship between my Latin American cultural heritage and the Gospel? Between my indigenous or African heritage and the Gospel?
Since the time of Las Casas and Sor Juana, Brown Theologians have railed against such cultural nationalism with fire and fury. Over the past fifty years, U.S. Latina/o theologians such as Justo Gonzalez,Elizondo, Conde-Frazier, and others have pushed back against such cultural nationalism by highlighting and reclaiming the blended, “mestizo” cultural roots of Jesus and the Galilean community which formed him, and framing theological concepts of mestizaje and mulatez.
In the words of Filipino theologian Jose de Mesa, that "God appears to us through the burning bush of our cultures."
Or in the words of Latino university minister, Orlando Crespo, “When we come to Christ we become more of who we are, not less.”
Chapter Three: Christology and Soteriology
Jesus of Galilee
As part of its healing process, the Brown Church has also had to decolonize its Christology and reconstruct a full-bodied, holistic gospel.This chapter examines ways in which Brown Theologians have reclaimed Christ and proclaimed a holistic Gospel in reaction to the culturally-circumscribed Iberian Christ of the Spanish Conquest and the “White Jesus” of American Christianity (Escobar). Brown Theology critiques the fact that many Europeans and their descendants remade Jesus in their own image and thereby turned Him into a tribal God to justify their socio-economic and political power and colonial domination. According to Samuel Escobar, the Spaniards at once brought a war-like Christ shaped by centuries of war with the Moors and a Christianity marked by a faith that is wielded for social gain.
Colonial Christology claimed adherence to the historic confession of the Nicene Creed, that Christ was full God and fully man, somehow, in a mystery, consubstantial with God the Father in His divinity, and, in His incarnation and humanity, consubstantial with us:
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages.
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and became man.
Notwithstanding theological orthodoxy as a matter of belief, as a practical expression, many colonial Christologies made one of two errors:
1. As with the Iberian Christ, they downplayed the humanity of Christ. Like the heresy of Docetism which threatened the early church, the divinity of Christ was highlighted but His humanity was underemphasized. The details of His earthly life as a marginalized Galilean were of slight importance, and, as a consequence of a small jump in logic, this Christ does not change the lives of those who follow him here and now, but only guarantees a happier future life. This Christology supports oppression and leads the poor to expect healing and justice only in the afterlife.
In contrast to the White, hawkish, docetic Christ of European colonialism and its progeny, Brown Theologians have reflected upon the significance of Christ’s marginalized Galilean human ancestry, while at the same time maintaining fidelity to sacred Scripture and the consensus of early church which worship Christ as fully God and fully man. The Brown Church is faithful to the Christology articulated by the diverse ethnic representatives of the Council of Nicaea. While holding to this orthodoxy, Latino theologians such as Virgilio Elizondo and Orlando Costas have reminded us that Jesus was a “Galilean.”
Galilee was far from the center of religious, political, and economic power in Jerusalem. Galileans like Jesus were poor, bilingual, and spoke with an accent. They were oppressed by Roman colonizers, as well as by the elites of their own people. They were shunned as cultural “mixed breeds” or “mestizos,” and their cultural and religious purity was often called into question. Galilee was the “hood” or “barrio” of Jesus’ day, and our Lord was a Galilean. Moreover, Christ died “outside of the gate” of institutional power, and it is there where we are instructed to meet Him. Jesus is indeed the Liberator.
2. Jesus as Consubstantial with Europeans: A second grave error of Christology made by many Europeans–whether Spanish, English, Dutch, or wherever colonial empire ruled–is that they consciously or subconsciously equated Jesus’ humanity with their own. Jesus is fully God and fully man according to the historic creeds, but, his humanity was consubstantial with White European Men. His skin was pale, his Gospel message promoted empire over darker skinned peoples, and only “whites”--a legally, sociologically, and even theologically defined term–were most legitimately God’s children. “Indians” and “Blacks” (which were also socially and legally constructed categories) were “natural slaves” according to the appropriation of Aristotelian philosophy which was trendy at the time. As natural slaves, they were “barbarians,” and therefore it was somehow morally and theologically acceptable to conquer them militarily in order to save their souls. And because they were natural slaves, well, it was also okay to literally enslave them and establish a system of racial chattel slavery which the world had never previously known. And, should they want to become Christian, then they would need to shed their inferior and sinful ethnic cultures, because, in the end, only Europeans really reflected the image of God. These are the 500 year old poisonous roots–the “weeds among the wheat” (Matthew 13:24-30)-- of White Christian Nationalism and MAGA Christianity, which are really no Christianity at all. Thankfully, the Brown Church, and Brown Theologians have been fighting such heresy for 500 years as well.
As a marginalized Galilean himself, Jesus understands the suffering of our Latina/o community in this present moment. And the “good news” is that he came as Lord and Savior to make us and the whole world new. Nothing and no one is left out. Jesus transforms us as individuals to be more and more like him, and then he sends us out as agents of transformation of all the brokenness and injustice of our world. René Padilla and Samuel Escobar call this misión integral: “the mission of the whole church to the whole of humanity in all its forms, personal, communal, social, economic, ecological, and political.”
And, as Justo Gonzalez points us out, such a vision of Christ’s healing and redemption of all creation is simply biblical and reflects the writings of the earliest church fathers and mothers such as Irenaeus. Just as Irenaeus fiercely challenged the heresy of Gnosticism masking itself as Christianity in his classic work, Against Heresies, so do Brown Theologians proclaim a “grito!” against the various heresies of White Christian Nationalism which mask themselves as Christianity in the U.S. today.
Chapter Four
Outsiders of Hope: A Brown Theology of Migration
Chapter four examines Brown Theologies of Immigration. Anti-immigrant politics and theologies in the US are a natural outgrowth of faulty Christology and Soteriology which grew from colonialism, as discussed in chapter three. According to Latina biblical studies scholar and theologian Jacqueline Hidalgo, in the face of experiences of xenophobia and displacement, the bible serves as a “homing device” for Cubans and other Latino Christians. In the many stories of migration and exile in the Bible, the Brown Church sees itself, finds solace, and makes home in the world.
Drawing upon this concept of Scripture as homing device, this chapter explores two theological concepts related to immigration: Outsider/“Paroikoi” Identity and Migration as Grace.
A central biblical metaphor for the church universal is that of strangers, resident aliens, and outsiders, or “paroikoi.” “Beloved, I urge you as strangers (paroikoi) and exiles to abstain from the desires of the flesh” (1 Peter 2:9-12). On the flip side, in Christ, we are no longer outsiders to God’s family, but rather are transformed into citizens of His loving reign : “So then you are no longer strangers and aliens (xenoi kai paroikoi), but [we] are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God”(Ephesians 2:19). As followers of Christ, we live in exile and alienness, living alongside the world and its machinations, yet not fully belonging.
As the transnational Church and Body of Christ, our great hope is that we who were once “outsiders” according to the standards of the world—based upon ethnic and immigration background—find our ultimate belonging in Christ and adoption into God’s family. As a natural consequence, we follow Christ “outside the gate” and offer that same welcome to all who are outsiders in society, especially among immigrants and the poor.
In the inspiring words of Jorge Lara-Braud from 1976: “Jesus lived and died as an outsider, in solidarity with all outsiders. He also rose to new life among outsiders, bringing with His resurrection, powers of liberation against which no evil force could ultimately triumph.”
Since the 1970’s, Latina/o theologians such as Lara-Braud have wrestled with the contradiction of religious nationalism and the central biblical metaphor of Parokoi/Outsider Identity. Through the text of Scripture, they “make home in the world”(Agosto and Hidalgo 2020) , seeing their own stories of migration and exile reflected as a central theme of the entire sacred Scripture, and thereby finding hope. This chapter explores the ways in which Brown Theologians such as Justo Gonzalez, Elizabeth Conde-Frazier, Daniel Carroll, Jacqueline Hidalgo, Efrain Agosto, Jean-Pierre Ruiz, Nancy Bedford, and Rodolfo Estrada have found a home of belonging in Scripture through the biblical narratives of Mary, Ruth, Joseph, the Babylonian Exile, the Roman Empire, and even the day laborers of the Book of Matthew. As such, they call the entire Body of Christ back to its original identity as “paroikoi” and the biblical ethic of hospitality.
A broad review of Scripture reveals a further, a second specific principle with respect to immigration: Migration is a source of grace both to migrants and their host country. Here, I define “grace” not in its limited sense of forgiveness, but in its broader biblical usage as God’s unmerited favor. So, to restate the previous principle in light of this definition: Migration is a
source of God’s love, mercy, and unmerited favor to both immigrants and their host countries. Throughout Scripture, God is shown to intervene in the lives of migrants to display His grace both to them and the host countries which receive them with biblical hospitality. The principle of migration as grace is exemplified in many biblical accounts such as the flight of Jesus, Joseph, and Mary to Egypt as asylum seekers fleeing death from political violence; Abraham’s travels to Egypt during famine (Genesis 12:10) as a type of ancient recipient of temporary protected status; and in the account of Joseph in Egypt, who, as a forced migrant was used by God to save the lives not only of his family but of thousands of Egypt and Canaan.
The principle of migration as grace is a searing indictment of the xenophobia and draconian immigration policies of the current presidential administration. Rather than modeling migration as grace, the U.S. is reflecting the oppression of Egypt. As a reflection of Pharaoh, will the U.S. continue to exploit the cheap labor of undocumented immigrants in order to buttress the economy while at the same time scapegoating them as part of an imagined cultural and political threat? Or, in reflection of Jesus and his radical hospitality, will we humble ourselves to recognize the manifold expressions of grace we receive from them and reciprocate this grace through the compassionate reformation of our immigration laws and policies?
Chapter Five
The Double Image of God: Women as Ministers, Preachers, and Theologians
This chapter explores the writings and common theological insights of key Latina theologians from 1985-2013. These writers are both Catholic and Protestant, as well as from both Latin America and the United States. This chapter examines the following landmark theological publications: Aida Besancon Spencer, Beyond the Curse: Women Called to Ministry (1985); Elsa Tamez, Through Her Eyes (1986); Maria Pilar Aquino, Our Cry for Life: Feminist Theology from Latin America (1992); Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz, En la Lucha / In the Struggle: A Hispanic Women's Liberation Theology (1993); and, Loida I. Martell-Otero, Zaida Maldonado-Perez, and Elizabeth Conde-Frazier, Latina Evangélicas: A Theological Survey From the Margins (2013).
Though an exhaustive analysis of these books would require many books, the goal of this chapter is to draw upon a few of their central common themes and theological insights to familiarize the reader with these little known texts and to inspire the reader to learn more.
The concept of the “double image of God” ties all of these books together. According to this concept, males and females together are needed to reflect God’s image and nature. Male and female form a unity in God’s plan of creation. The unity of male and female reflects the unity of the Trinity and the doctrine of perichoresis. God is neither male nor female because God is incorporeal; yet God is both male and female because both men and women reflect God’s image in equality and unity.
Though the image of God is a double image, the fall disrupted the unity between male and female, resulting in a curse which produced violent and inequitable gender relations. Machismo, patriarchy, domestic violence, destructive marriages and families, and all such manner of pain are the result. In the words of Maldonado-Perez, “machismo…kills our women and maim’s our men’s humanity. All these sins attack the work of many evangelical mothers and daughters who strive to live and model the hope that only the God of light can give.”
Christ the Savior redeems and restores broken gendered relationships and takes us “beyond the curse.” Christ redeems this terrible curse, restoring harmony and equality between women and men. Being a woman is a charism which must not be surrendered in favor of male ways of thinking and behaving.
Contrary to this egalitarian vision, the authors are also in agreement that androcentric and Eurocentric normativity over the past five hundred years of European colonialism established the flawed theological claim that women occupy an inferior role to men with respect to ministry, preaching, and theology. In the case of Latin America, distinctive patriarchal doctrines were brought to Latin America from Protestant missionaries who were complicit in the colonizing agenda. Though in theory many male-dominated Christian institutions recognize the ontological equality of men and women, when it comes to theology and ministry, such equality often hits a brick wall. Since the days of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz in the late 17th century, Latinas have challenged such inequality drawing upon Scripture and interdisciplinary tools, for they have recognized, in the words of Aquino, that “liberation is not total if it does not also emancipate women.”
The second part of this chapter examines some of the specific ways in which Spencer, Tamez, Aquino, Martell-Otero, Conde-Frazier, and others, such as Cecilia Gonzalez-Andrieu, have analyzed Scripture as a source of liberation for women: as “the light of our lives,” “the word of strength that strengthens my faith,” and as the “liberating word that illuminates the value of the whole human person” (Aquino).
Though coming from a range of denominational backgrounds, ranging from Catholic to Protestant, and even Pentecostal, the hearts of these writers have been stirred by common biblical themes which empower them as women and which make the compelling case for women as equals in ministry, preaching, and theology. These include: feminine images of God as womb (rachamim), wind (ruach), and wisdom (hochmah), and the Holy Spirit as mother. No humanly constructed boundaries can contain God, and the Church is intended to be a baptismal community of equal discipleship (Aquino).
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I close this chapter with a song that has inspired hope in the liberative struggles of Latin America since it was first written as a response to the Argentinian Dirty War in 1979. It is called, “Tenemos Esperanza,” and it is a tango-styled hymn authored by Methodist Bishop Federico Pagura. The song symbolized eschatological hope and resilience in the face of brutal dictatorship, as well as solidarity with the victims of human rights abuses and the tens of thousands who were “disappeared” by the authoritarian government. Tenemos Esperanza soon spread throughout Argentina and Latin America, and it inspired hope for the base ecclesial (BEC) movement of Latin America and Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, who received spiritual and practical support from the BEC’s. Adorned in white scarves representing their children’s diapers, these mothers of the “desaparecidos,” marched daily in front of the presidential plaza in nonviolent resistance, demanding to know the whereabouts of their loved ones.
Today, in the face of hundreds of our loved ones also being “disappeared” in the United States, may Tenemos Esperanza also inspire eschatalogical hope and resilience for us today: Tenemos Esperanza l Melissa Olachea & Urbana Worship (Live @ Urbana 18 Conference)
VERSO 1
Porque Él entró en el mundo y en la historia
(Because He came into the world and into history)
Porque Él quebró el silencio y la agonía
(Because He broke the silence and agony)
Porque llenó la tierra de Su gloria
(Because He filled the Earth with his glory)
Porque Él fue luz en nuestra noche fría
(Because He was light in our cold night)
Porque Él nació en un pesebre oscuro
(Because He was born in a dark manger)
Porque Él vivió sembrando amor y vida
(Because He lived sowing love and life)
Porque Él quebró los corazones duros
(Because He broke hard hearts)
Y levantó las almas abatidas
(And He lifted up the downcast souls)
CORO
Por eso es que hoy tenemos esperanza
(That is why today we have hope)
Por eso es que hoy luchamos con porfía
(That is why today we fight with tenacity)
Por eso es que hoy miramos con confianza
(That is why today we look with confidence)
El porvenir en esta tierra mía
(To the future in this land of mine)
Por eso es que hoy tenemos esperanza
(That is why today we have hope)
Por eso es que hoy luchamos con porfía
(That is why today we fight with tenacity)
Por eso es que hoy miramos con confianza el porvenir
(That is why today we look with confidence to the future)
VERSO 2
Porque atacó a ambiciosos mercaderes
(Because He attacked ambitious merchants)
Y denunció maldad e hipocresía
(And He denounced evil and hypocrisy)
Porque exaltó a los niños, las mujeres
(Because He exalted children and women)
Y resistió a los que de orgullo ardían
(And He resisted those who burned up in pride)
Porque Él cargó la cruz de nuestras penas
(Because He bore the cross of our sorrows)
Y saboreó la hiel de nuestros males
(And He tasted the bitterness of our ills)
Porque aceptó to sufrir nuestra condena
(Because He accepted suffering our condemnation)
Y así morir por todos los mortales
(And in this way to die for all mortals)
VERSO 3
Porque una aurora vió Su gran victoria
(Because a dawn saw His great victory)
Sobre la muerte, el miedo, y la mentira
(Over death, fear, and lies)
Ya nada puede detener su historia
(Nothing now can stop history)
Ni de Su Reino eterno la venida
(Or stop the coming of His eternal Kingdom)
Porque ilumina cada senda en gloria
(Because He illuminates each path with His glory)
Y las tinieblas derrotó con lumbre
(And the darkness He defeated with fire)
Porque Su luz es siempre nuestra historia
(Because His light is always our history)
Y ha de llevar a todos a la cumbre
(And He will bring everyone to the summit)