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Throughout the 19th and 20th Centuries many Latin American religious leaders developed theological teaching that centered around the Churches relationship with the poor and working class. Religion played a major role in the development of the Chilean labor movement. Several prominent leaders in the Catholic church played an active role in promoting organized labor and political participation in Chile.
Perhaps the movement’s most well-known figure is St. Alberto Hurtado Cruchaga, a Jesuit priest and one of two Chileans canonized as Saints by the Vatican. St. Alberto Hurtado dedicated his life to serving Chile’s poor and working class. In 1947, he founded the Chilean Trade Union Association to promote a union movement inspired by the social teaching of the Catholic Church. St. Alberto Hurtado also founded Hogar de Cristo a charity dedicated to providing services to the poor which still serves more than 25,000 people in modern Chile.
Los Sindicatos y la Iglesia
Over the course of the early and mid-20th Century, both leftist and centrist labor activists and political movements including Socialists and factions of the Christian Democratic Party became highly critical of American influence in Chile. Many Chileans began to see the presence of American-owned copper mining companies, including the anaconda copper mining company (acm) based in Montana, as a form of modern Imperialism. Beginning in the 1950s, the Chilean government began the process of nationalizing mines, which was ultimately completed under President Allende.