Dominican Republic and Haiti: Country Studies

Dominican Republic and Haiti: Country Studies
ported the efforts of peasants and sugar colonos to organize.
Their actions reflected the Church's becoming involved in
human rights issues in the 1980s, especially issues involving the
poor and the treatment of Haitians. Some of the Church hierarchy
also supported attempts to end corruption in government,
and the Church endorsed the move for free elections in
the 1990s.
In addition to Roman Catholics, the Dominican Republic
has Protestants and practitioners of voodoo. Protestants first
came as immigrants from North America in the 1820s. West
Indian laborers added to their numbers in the late nineteenth
and early twentieth centuries. By the 1920s, the various Protestant
groups had organized nationally and established links with
North American evangelical groups. The main evangelical
groups include the Seventh Day Adventists, the Dominican
Evangelical Church, and the Assemblies of God. Protestant
groups expanded, mainly in the rural areas, during the 1960s
and 1970s; pentecostals made considerable inroads in some
regions. The growth of the pentecostal movement during the
1980s was such that it became a major topic at the Fourth General
Conference of Latin American Bishops attended by Pope
John Paul II, held in October 1992, following the V Centenario
(500th anniversary) celebration in Santo Domingo of Columbus's
first trip to the Americas. In the late 1990s, the evangelicals
constitute 15 percent of the Protestant groups. With minor
exceptions, relations between Protestants and the majority
Roman Catholics are cordial.
Most Haitian immigrants and their descendants adhere to
voodoo but have practiced it quietly because the government
and the general population regard the folk religion as pagan
and African. In Haiti voodoo encompasses a well-defined system
of theology and ceremonialism (see Voodoo, ch. 7).
Culture
Literature
The Dominican Republic's literary history has had an
impact on the country's culture. Balaguer considered Father
Bartolome de las Casas (1474—1566), protector of the Indians
and author of The Devastation of the Indies, to have been the first
Dominican historian. As such he made the first contribution to
Dominican literature. However, most accounts would place the
first Dominican literary work much later with the publication
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