Recordando tiempos difíciles: La Vicaría de la Solidaridad como lugar de memoria de la Iglesia y de la sociedad Chilena

Abstract

The goal of this article is to present the Chilean Vicariate of Solidarity as a comprehensive site of memory ("lieu de mémoire"), where different and partly diverging memories gather and different memory-actors try to convey their views of the past and draw their conclusions for the present and the future. After some conceptual considerations (referring to the ideas of P. Nora, M. Halbwachs, A.; J. Assmann and S. Stern) the role of the Vicariate under the Chilean military rule will be examined in its sociopolitical and ecclesiastic context. It will be shown that the Vicariate was a core actor among those challenging the authoritarian regime and that it was very successful in defending Human Rights during the Pinochet-years. With the transition to democracy, the Vicariate became an important site of memory for the Chilean society as well as for the Church. Three dimensions will be illustrated: Firstly the archives of the Vicariate as a physical "lieu de mémoire", where the remaining documentation is being kept; secondly the Vicariate as a place to remember the collective struggle for human dignity and human rights; and finally the Vicariate as a site of memory for the the Chilean church's conception of itself. On each of these levels, different perceptions of the past compete. Thus the Catholic Church, for example, traces its struggle against emergency contraception back to its struggle for human life during the years of repression.