Because of Bananas: Manifest Destiny for the 21st-Century

March 18, 2025 by Miguel De La Torre

I was an undocumented immigrant in the country responsible for my expatriation. While living in a rat-and-roach-infested one-room apartment in the slums of Manhattan, my family and I received individual letters from the U.S. government. Dated June 21, 1960, the letters informed us that we…

Indigenous Wine: Dislodging Eurocentric Models That Lead to ‘Latinos for Trump’

March 5, 2025 by Miguel De La Torre

The guardians of white privilege normalize and legitimize a way of thinking and being that enslaves minds while allegedly freeing bodies. If the mind can be colonized, then those who society is constructed to benefit don’t need to worry about resistance to oppression. All too…

Confessions of a Christian Zionist

February 12, 2025 by Miguel De La Torre

Last month, I attended an international conference in Jordan, next to the site where Jesús was supposedly baptized by Juan el Baptista. The title of my presentation was “Confessions of a Former Christian Zionist.” I argued Christian Zionism is a manifestation of European white supremacy,…

My Pronouns

February 5, 2025 by Miguel De La Torre

All my life I have been referred to as “he, him, and his.” Such a designation is apropos being that I identify as a heterosexual male. My gender and orientation as provided me with a privilege where thinking about my identity and what to call…

Jimmy Carter: Guardian of Empire

January 14, 2025 by Miguel De La Torre

On December 2, I stood in the small chapel on the grounds of San Salvador’s Hospital Divina Providencia, whose mission is to provide palliative care. Almost forty-five years earlier, on March 24, 1980, the archbishop of El Salvador, Oscar Romero, living on the hospital’s property…

Butterfly Effect: The Politics of Chaos Didn’t Begin With Donald Trump

January 7, 2025 by Miguel De La Torre

Mass deportation. Prosecute rivals. Abolish FDIC. Cabinet choices. Partisan federal employees. Eliminate debt ceiling. Abolish birthright citizenship. Retake Panama Canal. Abandon Ukraine. Annex Canada. Criminalize wokeness. Abolish Palestine. Enact Article V of the Consitution. Dismantle NATO. Tariff wars. Fascist authoritarian tendencies. Pardon insurrectionists. Abolish the…

Bonhoeffer’s Ethics and Luis Mangione: Is Murder Ever Justified?

December 16, 2024 by Miguel De La Torre

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a pacifist, wrestled with an ethical dilemma. Is it moral to kill someone responsible for mass murder? He was thinking of Hitler and whether he should participate in the plot to assassinate him, which would have been an act of tyrannicide. While contemplating…

Copapayo: Blood-Soaked Lands Crying Out For Justice

December 10, 2024 by Miguel De La Torre

Suchitlán Lake is about an hour-and-a-half drive from San Salvador, mainly along backroads. Once there, we board a small powerboat named la Esperancito, “the little hope,” to continue our pilgrimage. We traverse the serene lake, hugged by undulating shores, for over an hour. Finally, we arrive at our…

Just As I Am: An Invitation to Salvation for U.S. Evangelicals

November 12, 2024 by Miguel De La Torre

My Dearest U.S. Evangelicals, In my early twenties, I walked down the “sawdust center aisle” in front of the entire congregation while the pianist softly played hymn number 472: “Just as I Am.” I publicly gave my life to Jesus on the first Advent Sunday…

The Prophet Plato Speaks Today

November 8, 2024 by Miguel De La Torre

One of the election themes from those who woke up Wednesday morning with a foreboding fear concerning election results was that our democracy is at risk. As I consider this risk, I am reminded of the words of the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. In his…