Las Hermanas: Chicana/Latina Religious Activism, 1971-1996

Team Members/Contributors

Lara Medina Claremont McKenna College

About this dissertation fellowship

This study critically interprets the historical significance of Las Hermanas, a twenty-six year old national organization of Chicana and Latina Roman Catholics. As a religious-political organization, Las Hermanas effectively brought the gender and ethnic struggles of the 1960s and 1970s into the religious realm. Through direct involvement in the Chicano movement, the organization expanded the ministerial role of the U.S. Roman Catholic Church bridging the civil rights of Latinos and their religious needs. Since 1980, they have influenced the articulation of Mujerista Theology, a blending of feminist concerns and “a preferential option for the poor.” Influenced by the renewal of Vatican II, Catholic feminism, the Black and Chicano civil rights movements and Latin American liberation theology, Chicana and Latina sisters organized in 1971 to fight the overt discrimination within the church towards Spanish-speaking communities and in society at large. Within six months, membership grew from fifty to seven hundred across twenty-one states. Between 1971-1980, Los Hermanas influenced major ecclesiastical bodies and participated in secular political movements. Early projects include opposing discriminatory employment practices towards Mexican sisters by the church, helping to establish the Mexican American Cultural Center, and participating in the farm workers movement and the struggle for the educational and political rights of Chicanos. Since 1980, Los Hermanas has focused specifically on issues affecting grass root Latinas, including moral authority, sexuality and domestic abuse. This study examines issues integral to a religious— political organization. Group identity, strategies of protest, feminist models of leadership and religious agency receive primary attention. In addition, it broadens existing scholarship in religious studies, women’s studies and Chicana/o studies as it examines ethnic, gender and political activism within the religious arena. Methodology relies on forty-five oral interviews and archival research at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio, Texas, the national repository for organizational records.

Image Title Year Type Contributor(s) Other Info
  Las Hermanas: Chicana/Latina Religious-Political Activism, 1971-1997 1998 Dissertation Lara Medina