Since the mid-1960s, relations between the church and the state have been characterized by conflicts with leftist guerrilla organizations, conflicts over human rights abuses and endemic economic injustices. During this period the theology of liberation reached a great boom, which coincided with the ascending period of the armed groups of the left, to which some priests and numerous lay Catholics attached. With the increase in political violence during the so-called third Peronism (1973–1976) the influence of conservative sectors in the Church increased, and even more so after the last coup d'etat, in March 1976, which gave way to a bloody military dictatorship, characterized by violations of human rights by the government.