Hélder Pessoa Câmara (7 February 1909 – 27 August 1999) was a Brazilian Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of Olinda and Recife from 1964 to 1985 during the

military dictatorship in Brazil The military dictatorship in Brazil (), occasionally referred to as the Fifth Brazilian Republic, was established on 1 April 1964, after a 1964 Brazilian coup d'état, coup d'état by the Brazilian Armed Forces, with support from the United Stat ...

. He was declared a

Servant of God Servant of God () is a title used in the Catholic Church to indicate that an individual is on the first step toward possible canonization as a saint. Terminology The expression ''Servant of God'' appears nine times in the Bible, the first five in ...

in 2015. A self-identified

socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...

, Câmara was an advocate of liberation theology. He did social and political work for the poor and for human rights and democracy during the military regime. Câmara preached for a church closer to the disfavoured people. He is quoted as having said, "When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

Early life and education

Câmara was born on 7 February 1909, in

Fortaleza Fortaleza ( ; ; ) is the state capital of Ceará, located in Northeast Region, Brazil, Northeastern Brazil. It is Brazil's 4th largest city—Fortaleza surpassed Salvador, Bahia, Salvador in 2022 census with a population of slightly over 2.4 mi ...

Ceará Ceará (, ) is one of the 26 states of Brazil, located in the Northeast Region, Brazil, northeastern part of the country, on the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast. It is the List of Brazilian states by population, eighth-largest Brazilian State by ...

, in the poor Northeast Region of Brazil. His father was an accountant and his mother was a primary school teacher. He was educated in local Catholic schools and entered

seminary A seminary, school of theology, theological college, or divinity school is an educational institution for educating students (sometimes called seminarians) in scripture and theology, generally to prepare them for ordination to serve as cle ...

in 1923.

Career

He was ordained a priest in 1931, with a dispensation from the

Holy See The Holy See (, ; ), also called the See of Rome, the Petrine See or the Apostolic See, is the central governing body of the Catholic Church and Vatican City. It encompasses the office of the pope as the Bishops in the Catholic Church, bishop ...

since he was below the canonical age. Câmara was named auxiliary bishop of

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...

Pope Pius XII Pope Pius XII (; born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli; 2 March 18769 October 1958) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death on 9 October 1958. He is the most recent p ...

on 3 March 1952. During his first years as a priest he was a supporter of the far-right Brazilian Integralist Action (''Ação Integralista Brasileira'', AIB), an ideological choice that he later rejected. He also founded two social organizations: the Ceará Legion of Work, in 1931, and the Women Workers' Catholic Union, in 1933. He was active in the formation of the Brazilian Bishops' Conference (CNBB) in 1952, and served as its first general secretary until 1964. In that role, he founded Caritas Brazil in 1956. In 1959, he founded Banco da Providência in

, a philanthropic organization to fight poverty and social injustice by facilitating the contraction of loans by poorer populations. On 12 March 1964,

Pope Paul VI Pope Paul VI (born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini; 26 September 18976 August 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 21 June 1963 until his death on 6 August 1978. Succeeding John XXII ...

appointed him Archbishop of Olinda e Recife. During his tenure, Câmara was informally called the "bishop of the slums" for his clear position on the side of the urban poor. With other clerics, he encouraged peasants to free themselves from their conventional fatalistic outlook by studying the gospels in small groups and proposing the search for social change from their readings. He attended all four sessions of the

Second Vatican Council The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the or , was the 21st and most recent ecumenical council of the Catholic Church. The council met each autumn from 1962 to 1965 in St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City for session ...

and played a significant role in drafting ''

Gaudium et spes (, "Joys and Hopes"), the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, is one of the four constitutions promulgated during the Second Vatican Council between 1963 and 1965. Issued on 7 December 1965, it was the last and longest publ ...

''. On 16 November 1965, a few days before the council ended, 40 bishops led by Câmara met at night in the Catacombs of Domitilla outside Rome. They celebrated the Eucharist and signed a document under the title of the Pact of the Catacombs. In 13 points, they challenged their brother bishops to live lives of evangelical poverty: without honorific titles, privileges, and worldly ostentation. They taught that "the collegiality of the bishops finds its supreme evangelical realization in jointly serving the two-thirds of humanity who live in physical, cultural, and moral misery". They called for openness "to all, no matter what their beliefs". Providencia

Under the guidance of Câmara, the Catholic Church in Brazil became an outspoken critic of the 1964–1985 military dictatorship. and a powerful movement for social change. Câmara spoke out and wrote about the implications of using violence to repress rebellion resulting from poverty and injustice in other venues than Brazil. Traditionalist Catholics urged the military government to arrest Câmara for his support of

land reform Land reform (also known as agrarian reform) involves the changing of laws, regulations, or customs regarding land ownership, land use, and land transfers. The reforms may be initiated by governments, by interested groups, or by revolution. Lan ...

and Câmara's colleague, Father Antônio Henrique Pereira Neto, was murdered by unknown conservative forces. A proponent of liberation theology, he was Archbishop of the Diocese of

Olinda Olinda () is a historic city in Pernambuco, Brazil, in the Northeast Region, Brazil, Northeast Region. It is located on the country's northeastern Atlantic Ocean coast, in the Recife metropolitan area, Metropolitan Region of Recife, the state ca ...

and

Recife Recife ( , ) is the Federative units of Brazil, state capital of Pernambuco, Brazil, on the northeastern Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic coast of South America. It is the largest urban area within both the North Region, Brazil, North and the Northeast R ...

from 1964 to 1985, the entirety of the dictatorship. Liberation theology brought forth the political aspect of the Church's charitable work and was criticized on the grounds that it was encouraging the armed revolutionary struggles that swept Latin America during the 1970s and 1980s. Câmara published ''Spiral of Violence'' in 1971, a short tract written when the United States was immersed in a still escalating

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (1 November 1955 – 30 April 1975) was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam (Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and South Vietnam (Republic of Vietnam) and their allies. North Vietnam w ...

. It is distinctive for linking structural injustice (Level 1 violence) with escalating rebellion (Level 2 violence) and repressive reaction (Level 3 violence). In it, Câmara called on the youth of the world to take steps to break the spiral, saying their elders became addicted to those escalating steps. He died in

on 27 August 1999, aged 90.

Views

Câmara endorsed the position of the Orthodox Church that spouses who were abandoned should be allowed to remarry within the church. He also admitted women's ordination.Come i progressisti ''non'' vinsero al Concilio / Una recensione di ''Roma, Due del Mattino'' di Monsignor Hélder Câmara / di Massimo Introvigne, CESNUR Official Website (Italian)
/ref> He criticized

's removal of artificial contraception from the purview of the Second Vatican Council as "a mistake" meant to "torture spouses, to disturb peace of many homes", "a new condemnation of Galileo", "the death of the Council" and "the practical denial of

collegiality Collegiality is the relationship between colleagues, especially among peers, for example a fellow member of the same profession. Colleagues are those explicitly united in a common purpose and, at least in theory, respect each other's abilities t ...

". According to the former Vatican's Secretariat of State, however, Câmara went on to send a telegram to the Vatican praising the encyclical ''Humanae Vitae''. In his famous interview with Italian journalist

Oriana Fallaci Oriana Fallaci (; 29 June 1929 – 15 September 2006) was an Italian journalist and author. A member of the Italian resistance movement during World War II, she had a long and successful journalistic career. Fallaci became famous worldwide for h ...

, he also stated that, despite his support for non-violence, he did not condemn violent tactics: "And I respect a lot priests with rifles on their shoulders; I never said that to use weapons against an oppressor is immoral or anti-Christian. But that's not my choice, not my road, not my way to apply the Gospels".Entrevistas históricas: Oriana Fallaci entrevista dom Helder Câmara, Socialista Morena Website (Portuguese)
Engl. trans. in Oriana Fallaci. ''Interview with History'', London: Michael Joseph (1976). , pp. 288–309. Câmara identified himself as a socialist and not as a Marxist, but while disagreeing with

Marxism Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflict, ...

, had Marxist sympathies. In the Fallaci interview, he stated, "My socialism is special, it's a socialism that respects the human person and goes back to the Gospels. My socialism is justice." He said, concerning Marx, that while he disagreed with his conclusions, he agreed with his analysis of the capitalist society. He never denied his communist sympathies and he openly supported dialogue with communists. He believed in the Fátima apparitions but he interpreted its call for the "conversion of Russia" as meaning that the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

would abandon its anti-religious policies but will not be rejecting communism. He wrote: "And what was the appeal of Fatima for?... Not for the annihilation of the USSR and China, but for their conversion... In 1967, the Russian Revolution will celebrate its jubilee... We must accelerate the pace, there is no more time to waste". In a poem dedicated to French Dominican priest Louis-Joseph Lebret, Câmara states his belief that

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

is in

Heaven Heaven, or the Heavens, is a common Religious cosmology, religious cosmological or supernatural place where beings such as deity, deities, angels, souls, saints, or Veneration of the dead, venerated ancestors are said to originate, be throne, ...

, and has him decorating Lebret of behalf of

Jesus Christ Jesus (AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, and many Names and titles of Jesus in the New Testament, other names and titles, was a 1st-century Jewish preacher and religious leader. He is the Jesus in Chris ...

: “Who decorated you/ in the name of Christ/ It was Karl Marx,/ taken to heaven/ for criticizing capital/ and for the protection of workers?!.../ And the lack of understanding regarding faith?/ It was the Christians' fault/ that he found around and gave him wrong vision/ of Christ and Christianity?...."

Legacy and honors

*In 1973, Câmara was nominated for the

Nobel Peace Prize The Nobel Peace Prize (Swedish language, Swedish and ) is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the Will and testament, will of Sweden, Swedish industrialist, inventor, and armaments manufacturer Alfred Nobel, along with the prizes in Nobe ...

by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). His candidacy was however undermined by two conservative members ( Sjur Lindebrække and Bernt Ingvaldsen) of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, who cooperated with the Brazilian ambassador in Oslo as the military dictatorship in Brazil was vehemently against him receiving the Nobel peace prize. *In 1975, he was awarded the Pacem in Terris Award, initiated by the Catholic Interracial Council of the Diocese of

Davenport, Iowa Davenport ( ) is a city in Scott County, Iowa, United States, and its county seat. It is situated along the Mississippi River on the eastern border of the state. Davenport had a population of 101,724 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 cen ...

. It was named after a 1963

encyclical An encyclical was originally a circular letter sent to all the churches of a particular area in the ancient Roman Church. At that time, the word could be used for a letter sent out by any bishop. The word comes from the Late Latin (originally fr ...

letter by

Pope John XXIII Pope John XXIII (born Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli; 25 November 18813 June 1963) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 28 October 1958 until his death on 3 June 1963. He is the most recent pope to take ...

that calls upon all people of good will to secure peace among all nations. '' Pacem in terris'' is

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

for "Peace on Earth".

Servant of God

On 15 February 2015, the Archbishop of Olinda and Recife, Antônio Fernando Saburido announced that he was sending a letter to the

requesting the opening of the process of canonization of Câmara. The letter was received on 16 February 2015, and less than ten days later, the assent was given by the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints, meaning that Câmara was given the title of

on 7 April 2015. The opening of the beatification process took place on 3 May that year in Olinda Cathedral. This marked the beginning of the diocesan phase of the

beatification Beatification (from Latin , "blessed" and , "to make") is a recognition accorded by the Catholic Church of a deceased person's entrance into Heaven and capacity to intercede on behalf of individuals who pray in their name. ''Beati'' is the p ...

process.http://site.adital.com.br /site/noticia.php?lang=EN&cod=84903 https://web.archive.org/web/20150518093834/http://site.adital.com.br/site/noticia.php?lang=EN&cod=84903

Notes

References

External links

Links for Dom Helder Camara

Alastair McIntosh website
Text of Câmara's 1972 speeches to Mani Tese
University of St. Thomas
The 1965 "Pact of the catacombs" for a servant and poor church
{{DEFAULTSORT:Camara, Helder 1909 births 1999 deaths 20th-century Roman Catholic archbishops in Brazil 20th-century Roman Catholic theologians Brazilian anti-capitalists Brazilian Christian socialists Brazilian Roman Catholic theologians Brazilian Servants of God Catholic socialists Christian socialist theologians Liberation theologians Participants in the Second Vatican Council People from Fortaleza Roman Catholic archbishops of Olinda e Recife Roman Catholic bishops of São Sebastião do Rio de Janeiro