Víctor Manuel Márquez Padreñan

How do Christian pastors engage in everyday political life under the “state of emergency” declared by the Chilean government in response to actions by autonomous movements in the Wallmapu, the ancestral territory of the Mapuche People in Chile and Argentina? Since the early 20th century, Methodist missionaries have established a lasting presence, significantly reshaping socioeconomic life and mediating Mapuche relationships with the Chilean state. In the 1970s, a surge in Pentecostal conversions under Pinochet’s dictatorship introduced deep theological divides within Mapuche communities. Today’s state of exception, marked by intensified state repression of indigenous land-back activists, has triggered theological disputes around models of indigeneity. My research asks: How do theological theories of history shape concepts of indigeneity in Wallmapu?; How do different theological concepts of landscape shape Christian pastoral work and relate to competing state and economic projects?; How do mystical practices and political convictions interrelate, and how are they articulated in everyday life and social organization? I aim to address the puzzle wherein “outsider Christians” advocate for more radical models of indigeneity than “insider Christians,” who embrace national loyalties. This analysis challenges nativist narratives that oppose native/settler categories in studies of indigeneity within settler-colonial societies.