Spain: The Winds of Change

When he made a confession of faith in Jesus Christ and became a Protestant in 1949, Dr. Ruben Gil lost his job as a journalist for the Falange (Spain’s only political party). “I had no work at all for nine months. I was persecuted,” he remembers.

But the Southern Baptist convert went on to become pastor of a Baptist church in Alicante on the east coast of Spain before becoming coordinator two years ago of the Iberian Congress on Evangelization. The gathering, held in the Congress and Exposition Palace of Madrid last June, drew more than 3,000 evangelicals from Spain and Portugal—the largest demonstration of Protestant unity in Spanish history.

“Evangelicals in Spain and Portugal have entered a new day,” commented Gil, who heads the OMS International mission unit in Madrid. Others who have watched political and religious tides in Spain for the past decade agree that religious liberty is steadily increasing in this land where 99 per cent of the 34 million inhabitants are considered Roman Catholic.

“What persecution there is, is provoked,” says Dr. Gil. Other evangelicals, like John Blake, who books and shows Billy Graham films throughout Spain, say this assessment is largely true but that pockets of resistance—especially in the conservative, rural areas of Spain—still exist.

In a sunny country that has been a virtual theocracy for 500 years, all Protestant and Jewish organizations founded since the Religious Freedom Law was implemented in 1968 annually must file with the government a list of the names and addresses of members, a financial statement, and a statement of belief. But the requirement is evidence of religious freedom, not oppression, an observer points out. Spain probably has the smallest Protestant minority of any country in the Western world.

And as Spain edges toward a new political era, there are signs of slow but steady democratization, evident particularly in the gradual loosening of ties between church and state. A process of transition was set in motion last July when General Francisco Franco, 81, the ruler of Spain since 1939, transferred power temporarily to Prince Juan Carlos de Borbon while Franco was gravely ill. Prince Juan Carlos, 36, heir to the now-vacant Spanish throne, will take over—it is presumed—upon the death of the autocratic Catholic chief of state.

Even under the absolute dominion of the Franco regime, the constitution approved in 1966 has provided for the gradual liberalization of the political system. The alliance between the Catholic Churches and the Falange is breaking up, observers say, because of forces within both the church and the government.

Explained one young priest: “Younger priests who studied at the time of Vatican II are generally interested in the brotherhood of man and are ecumenical. The older priests are more traditional, so there is a tension.”

The conservative bishops, though a strong and vocal minority, are waning in number and as a prop to the Franco regime.

The 1953 Concordat between Spain and the Vatican is still in force, however. Article 1 begins: “The Catholic Apostolic Roman religion will continue to be the sole religion of the Spanish nation and will enjoy the right and prerogatives which are due it in conformity with the Divine Law and the Canon Law.”

The Concordat lays down the rules between state and church. In return for control of the naming of Spanish bishops—an important political advantage for Franco—the Spanish government subsidizes the church with buildings, salaries, and tax benefits. It frees priests from the jurisdiction of civil courts and guarantees the sanctity of church buildings.

Though officials of the Spanish hierarchy, the Vatican, and the Franco government all agree the Concordat needs revising, efforts to do so have thus far failed. Archbishop Agostini Casaroli, the Vatican’s counterpart of Henry Kissinger, has held secret talks with Spanish officials in Madrid several times in the past year. Neither he nor his officers will tell the press what progress—if any—toward revising, or perhaps dropping, the Concordat has been made. Nevertheless, there are clear indications of Vatican backing of the emerging reform movement, according to clergyman Thomas S. Goslin of Madrid, a United Presbyterian attached to the Spanish Evangelical Church and the only American Protestant ecumenical missionary to Spain. “Winds of change are blowing everywhere,” he said during an interview in Madrid’s posh Euro-building Hotel where his English-speaking Community Church meets each Sunday morning in a lobby.

So far the Spaniards have reacted calmly as a momentous chapter in their history draws to an end. Franco has expressed hope that an orderly transition of power will preserve the continuity of the regime and shore it against any avalanches in the future. But pressures in the transition period are apt to be severe. Even evangelical leaders, who firmly approve the principle of church-state separation, have apprehensions over what could happen if the church-state cord is cut completely.

“Full separation may kill both [church and state],” reasoned Goslin, pointing out that together the two are a “real theocracy.” And evangelical cleric Jose Cardona, a Baptist minister who is the Spanish government’s mediator assigned to Protestant groups, was explicit: Full separation would cut off financial support from the government needed by the church.

The friendly, energetic Cardona, 50, is the man most responsible for the Religious Freedom Law, which gives recognition and legal standing to Protestants. He is secretary to a Madrid judicial court. But he is also secretary of the Evangelical Legal Assistance Service. Wearing that hat, he applies the religious liberty law to specific cases and goes to bat for victims of discrimination. His role in religious freedom is thus a key one, especially for evangelicals.

‘The law guarantees that authorities must recognize the churches and their pastors, and it provides for new schools, churches, seminaries, Protestant books and magazines, radio broadcasts, and public meetings,” he said. Until the law was passed, Protestants couldn’t occupy buildings that looked like churches, couldn’t put up identifying signs—not even a cross on the outside of the building.

Surprisingly, perhaps, the new freedom has fragmented Spanish Protestantism, says Goslin. On the one hand, removal of pressure from the Catholic Church has increased dialogue between the conciliar Protestant groups and the Catholic hierarchy; on the other, this has alienated conservative and fundamental Protestants—many of whom are still bitterly anti-Catholic—from the ecumenical Protestants.

In 1972, for example, Bishop Antonio Briva Mirabent of Astorga gave a major address at the biennial synod of the Spanish Evangelical Church (the Spanish Reformed Episcopal Church is the only other Spanish Protestant group to have official fellowship with Catholics). He was the first Catholic prelate to speak at a national Protestant gathering in Spain. In contrast, Catholics were not invited to the Iberian Congress on Evangelization.

Modern Protestantism in Spain dates to the Spanish Civil War of 1936–39. When Franco came to power—with insurgent forces and the help of Hitler and Mussolini—Protestant churches were prohibited and believers were scattered. Congregations gradually returned, however. Pastors were trained, and missionaries resumed work. From a mere handful in 1939, Spanish Protestants have grown—under difficult circumstances—to 30,000. Calling themselves “evangelicals” to avoid bad feelings attached to the word “Protestant,” they now have 400 meeting places and 350 national workers and pastors. And there are 150 North American missionaries in Spain.

The largest denominational groups are the Brethren Assemblies (known as the Plymouth Brethren in the U. S.), with 100 churches and preaching points, and nearly 10,000 members; the Spanish Evangelical Baptist Union, associated with the Southern Baptist Convention, with 100 meeting places, and 6,000 to 7,000 members; the Federation of Independent Evangelical Churches of Spain, with thirty-five churches and 3,000 members; the Spanish Evangelical Church, established in the nineteenth century, and representing historic Reformation Protestantism, with fifty churches and 3,000 members; the Spanish Reformed Episcopal Church, about the same size, and various Pentecostal groups having a total of several thousand members.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses claim exceptional growth, and an ethnic church of several thousand thrives among the Gypsies. The heaviest concentration of evangelicals is along the east coast, particularly in the Barcelona area. One of the country’s three Protestant seminaries is there; the others are in Madrid. Combined enrollment is under a hundred.

The remaining resistance toward Protestant groups in Spain, say sources, centers around the use of public buildings for evangelistic meetings, military allegiance, and Canon Law as it relates to mixed marriages.

John Blake of Worldwide Pictures, a Billy Graham subsidiary, said that three times in the past three years local anti-Protestant pressure either kept him—or almost kept him—from showing Graham films. Protestants are not allowed to broadcast on Spanish television. A few religious programs are permitted on radio if stringent conditions are observed. Protestant churches, observes Goslin, cannot yet own real property or maintain bank accounts in the name of the congregation.

Goslin also points to a requirement of new military recruits: they must pledge allegiance to the Spanish flag during a ceremonial mass. Refusal may bring jail; some Protestant youths have preferred confinement to taking part.

Several months ago a Canon Law case involving a woman convert to the Spanish Evangelical Church received headline attention. The law says a Catholic can obtain a legal separation from a spouse if the partner becomes a member of a non-Catholic church. The woman convert tried unsuccessfully to contest her Catholic mate’s separation action—which included child custody and property settlement.

The Age Of Consent

Two leading British churchmen recently proposed liberalization of criminal law relating to rape, incest, prostitution, and the age of consent for both homosexual and heterosexual acts.

The proposals come from the Sexual Law Reform Society, whose chairman is Dr. John A. T. Robinson. As bishop of Woolwich he rocked the church establishment with his courtroom defense of D. H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover in 1960, and with his book Honest to God a decade ago.

A member of the society’s working party that produced the report is Lord Timothy Beaumont, a millionaire Anglican priest who is treasurer of the Liberal party and was publisher of the now defunct radical left-wing fortnightly New Christian. Also on the working party is Anglican laywoman Monica Furlong, a best-selling author and journalist.

Among their recommendations:

The age of consent for both boys and girls to engage in homosexual as well as heterosexual acts should be lowered to 14 [the present age of consent for girls is 16 and for male homosexuals, 21]. Most other sexual offenses including rape and incest should be abolished or merged with other laws.… It should no longer be an offense to live on the earnings of prostitution nor to use premises as a brothel.

The report is not entirely permissive, however. It calls for sentences up to five years for having sexual relations with a girl or boy known to be under 14, and up to two years for procuring a boy or girl under 18 to engage in prostitution. It calls for maximum freedom of sexual choice and lists only three areas where restriction or punishment is needed: where there was no true consent, where one party was not fully responsible because of age or condition, or where direct public offense is given and complained of.

At a press conference to launch the report Bishop Robinson, now dean of Trinity College, Cambridge, described the present law governing sexual offenses as a “jungle.”

Reaction from other British churchmen has so far been cautious, though one evangelical leader commented: “At this rate Bishop Robinson will soon be defending Baby Chatterley’s Lover.”

JOHN CAPON

Religion In Transit

Representatives of sixteen religious publishing houses have formed the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association, based in La Habra, California. Robert L. Mosier, president of Baptist Publications of Denver, was elected president. Don Brandenburgh of Whittier, California, is executive director.

Those fifteen-month-old Siamese twins separated in September by surgeon C. Everett Koop and a medical team at Children’s Hospital in Philadelphia (see October 11 issue, page 46) left the hospital on Thanksgiving to return to the Dominican Republic. The evangelical Medical Assistance Programs of Wheaton, Illinois, with which Koop is associated, has assumed follow-up care.

Between January, 1957, and last June, Vice-President-designate Nelson Rockefeller contributed $24.7 million to charitable causes, he says, including $782,763 to religious groups. More than $250,000 went to New York Catholic work. Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, pastored by Dr. Martin Luther King, Sr., received $132,312. The independent Union Church of Pocantico Hills, New York, of which Rockefeller is a member, received $29,596. A non-church item was $581,000 to the United Jewish Appeal in New York City.

Federal Communications Commission chief, Richard E. Wiley, a United Methodist, has been discussing with television network executives the growing complaints about the moral content of television programming. Several congressional committees want the FCC to report by the end of the month on what is being done to cut down on excessive explicit sexual content and violence on TV.

Members of First Baptist Church, Dallas, oversubscribed the church’s proposed $4 million budget for 1975 by more than $160,000.

The U. S. Supreme Court upheld the Church of the New Song as a proper religion and therefore entitled to the rights guaranteed under the First Amendment. New Song was founded in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary by prisoner Harry W. Theriault, self-styled bishop of the church. Theriault, now imprisoned in Texas, once testified the church began as a game (adherents claimed steak was a necessary element to their faith). The case began when Iowa prison officials refused New Song members access to the prison chapel.

Raymond Brown, principal of Spurgeon’s College, a Baptist institution in London, was elected president of the British Evangelical Alliance effective January 1, replacing Anglican pastor John Stott.

Dr. W. Sterling Cary, president of the National Council of Churches, will become executive minister of the Illinois Conference of the United Church of Christ when his NCC term ends in January.

By virtue of his new title in succeeding the retiring Michael Ramsey as archbishop of Canterbury and primate of the Church of England, Archbishop Donald Coggan will also become president of the British Council of Churches.

The Reinhold Niebuhr Award was conferred at the University of Chicago upon Soviet physicist Andrei Sakharov and deposed South African church leader Beyers Naude. Both men were cited for their advocacy of human rights. Sakharov’s award was presented to a proxy. Each winner got a citation and $5,000.

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