A Vanguard for the Counterrevolution: “Catholic Action” and the Transnational Project of La Ciudad Católica in Argentina, 1959-1976

Abstract

This article examines the impact of La Ciudad Católica, an organization formed in 1959 by French and Argentine lay activists who coined and proposed a counterrevolutionary interpretation of Catholic social doctrine. Prompted by the rise of progressive Catholicism, Argentina’s internal crises, and the global Cold War, Ciudad Católica advocated the formation of a counterrevolutionary vanguard and the grassroots mobilization of an “Army of God” to counter the threat of “revolutionary war” and build a new Christian state. While partaking in a transnational network of counterrevolutionary Catholicism, these activists provided theological justifications for “anti-subversive war” and the dismantling of the liberal state.