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Final Notice This will be the last item on my blog before 31 July when Google will stop sending you automatic notifications that something has been posted. If you have not yet done so, you can send me an email headed “blog notification” and I will email you when a new item is added. I have been posting less frequently lately because I am busy revising my book for publication, but will continue to post from time to time. |
8 January 1611 was a big day in San Luis de los Yopes, a town situated on the lower slopes of the Sierra Madre del Sur as the mountains descend to the Pacific coast of Mexico, for the town had an important visitor. The visiting dignitary was the Dominican friar, Alonso de la Mota y Escobar, bishop of Tlaxcala, although rather confusingly his cathedral and residence was in the city of Puebla de los Ángeles, not Tlaxcala itself. Don Alonso was on a tour of parts of his diocese, which from 22 December 1610 to 6 February 1611 took him to 25 towns in 36 days in the rugged, dusty, hot mountains of the Costa Chica and Montaña of Guerrero. By the end of his visit, he had confirmed more than 5,750 adult faithful Indians. The largest number (902) in a single day was achieved in Olinalá, a town close to a silver mining district, which may have accounted for the large numbers, since the mines were worked by Indian labourers.
The bishop reported that the Indigenous people of San Luis grew cotton and cacao, were well-behaved and schooled in the faith. They also enjoyed a good party, as, it seems, did don Alonso, for they honoured him with a fiesta, at the climax of which the bishop struck the blow which killed a bull. Thus, in addition to reporting the number of Confirmations he was able to carry out, the bishop’s report provides snapshots of the state of evangelization, aspects of daily life in individual parishes, and the rather variable character of the priests. In Huamuxtitlán, for example, the parish priest obliged the Indians to supply his meals, which was not allowed, and did not speak Nahuatl, the lingua franca considered essential for successful ministry. The Indians rejoiced when the bishop told them they need not feed their priest. He replaced the incumbent with a Nahuatl speaker. In Mochitlán Fray Alonso confirmed 371 members of the faithful, but the Indians complained about their priest and asked for the return of a father Carreño. In Apango he confirmed 594 natives and admonished the priest for his relationship with “a certain woman concerning whom he has a bad reputation”. In Tixtla the priest was accused of overcharging. The bishop ordered the priest to repay the excess charges and gave the Indians the scale of fees. Such behaviour was by no means uncommon in other parts of Guerrero and of New Spain. While most priests seem to have been responsible and benevolent, others levied excessive charges, demanded payments or services to which they were not entitled or mistreated Indians. Such behaviour scandalized Indians, especially the nobility, since they expected priests to match the standards of personal propriety that had generally characterized the precontact priesthood.
Things were better in Ayutla close to the hot tropical coast, where the priest set a good example and treated the Indians well. Here the bishop preached to Spaniards, mestizos and mulattos, as well as Indians, a sign of the demographic shift that resulted from the mass deaths of Indians on the coast, and, he recorded, “I confirmed 570 children of God [criaturas], of all colours”. In Olinalá, was another good priest. The Indians were “very admirable people and well dressed”. They produced a quantity of cochineal and jícaras (cups for drinking chocolate made from gourds) painted in many colours. Olinalá is still famed today for its lacquer work, a tradition dating back to well before the 16th century.
San Luis Acatlán (270 confirmed) was governed by a well-respected cacique (the Spanish term for an indigenous ruler) who spoke Spanish, don Domingo de los Ángeles. Don Domingo may have adopted some Spanish manners, but he also observed some of the courtesies and social rituals of his prehispanic heritage. He treated the bishop very attentively “in the manner of the caciques of old”. With great modesty, he beseeched Fray Alonso not to offend him by refusing a humble gift of a cotton bed canopy sewn by his daughters and worth 15 pesos (a tidy sum) and a little ground cacao. The bishop reciprocated with a gift of a fine shirt, some conserves and five precious stones (cornelians). Don Domingo had welcomed with elaborate formality and modestly beseeched the friar to receive his gifts, much as his Postclassic predecessors might have welcomed a visiting dignitary or a group of migrants seeking a new home. The bishop encountered an equally courteous, but impoverished, cacique two days later in Sochitonala. This cacique was not to be outdone. He offered another bed canopy and a substantial quantity of cacao. The bishop thanked him, but explained that it would be cruel to accept such a generous gift from such poor people.
Not every visit went smoothly. In Zapotitlán de Tablas don Alonso confirmed not a single person. The Indians flatly refused to cooperate, even when told they need not bring candles, a significant concession since candles were expensive items. Similar blandishments – Confirmation without charge and candles – also failed dismally in Tlacoapa. In Tlapa don Alonso reported that the Indians were badly schooled in the faith and were notorious for idolatry. Worse still, the bishop received reports that the friar responsible for Tlapa, Fray Domingo de Tovar, procured young girls for an idolatrous, drunken Indian who spent the tribute (tax) he collected from his subjects on himself, rather than for the benefit of the community. The bishop also criticized the friars of Alcozauca and Totomixtlahuaca. In Chilapa, the site of a large monastery, the conduct of the prior was decidedly un-clerical, so much so that don Alonso refused to go there. However, the Augustinian friar of Quechultenango was so poor that the bishop declined to stay there to spare the father the expense of providing a meal.
Don Alonso’s account of his visit to eastern Guerrero is discussed in the book I am contracted to write for the University of New Mexico Press. One of the reviewers of my text questioned whether the bishop was baptizing people, but the term used in the report is confirmé (I confirmed) not bautizé (I baptized). This caused me to investigate, with the help of some Catholic friends[1], the sacrament of Confirmation. In the early church three sacraments, Baptism, Confirmation and the Eucharist, were celebrated by adults annually at Easter. “The catechumens [those joining the Church community] descended into a pool where they were baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. They ascended, were clothed with a white robe, and the bishop laid hands on them and anointed them with oil. They then proceeded to a place of honor among the community where they participated in the Eucharist for the first time. Initiation thus consisted of one event with several moments. The climax was the celebration of the Eucharist.”[2]
As the numbers of the faithful grew, there were too many faithful for the bishops of the Western Church to deal with all three sacraments. The bishops therefore delegated baptism to the priests, but continued to be responsible for Confirmation. The essentials of Confirmation consist of a number of elements. The sacrament begins with the presentation of the candidates by a priest, followed by a homily given by the bishop. The bishop then asks the catechumens a number of questions to renew the baptismal vows made on their behalf by their godparents. The bishop and the priest then extend their hands over them. The bishop says or sings a prayer and anoints each catechumen by making the sign of the Cross on the forehead with a specially consecrated olive oil (known as chrism). This is usually followed by Mass and the Eucharist.
Whether, in practice, Confirmation in New Spain was modified to take account of local conditions, I have not yet managed to find out. A helpful professor, Atria Larson at St Louis University (a Catholic institution responsible to the Vatican), who specializes in Medieval canon law, told me that canon law routinely recognized extenuating circumstances, provided the essentials of the sacrament (anointing with chrism and the bishop pronouncing the required words) were observed. Another scholar, Tom Izbicki, emeritus professor of Rutgers University, passed on a story about Hugh of Lincoln, a 12th-century French monk and bishop of Lincoln, who refused to administer Confirmation from horseback.
Tom also mentioned that a late Medieval handbook for curates states that the Pope had to delegate authority for priests, rather than bishops, to confirm catechumens. The authority of bishops to administer Confirmation was clearly well-established in Mexico by 1610, as a heated debate in the Third Mexican Provincial Council of 1585 demonstrated. The first clergy to evangelize in New Spain were the friars of the religious orders, the Franciscans first of all, followed by the Augustinians and Dominicans, and later the Jesuits. The orders jealously guarded their independence. In the 1585 council the Franciscan Jerónimo de Mendieta argued that the religious orders had made a much better job of converting the Indians than the secular clergy (as ordinary priests were termed). Therefore, he declared, the bishops should have no authority over the friars unless they were very badly behaved, and should limit their activities in parishes for which the orders were responsible to Confirmation. The Franciscans claimed the authority of the King himself for this position. However, despite claiming royal backing the Franciscans did not dare trespass on the prerogative of bishops to carry out Confirmation.
Don Alonso was 64 years old, and had usually ridden on horse or mule back some 40km or so (occasionally more) in no great comfort. He described one journey over “seven deadly leagues of very bad road”, and recorded that in Sochitonala there were “infinite mosquitos”. He must have been a determined and robust man. He was surely assisted by the local priest, perhaps a priest or two who travelled with him, and indigenous church assistants. We know from the reports of parish priests, who ministered to large parishes, that without their indigenous church officials they could not have performed their duties. Many, but by no means all, clerics spoke Nahuatl, and even a century after the defeat of the Aztecs only a minority of native Mexicans spoke Spanish. There were a good many Nahuatl speakers in the Costa Chica and the Montaña, but also many whose language was Mixtec, Tlapanec or Mixtec, so the clergy must have depended on bilingual assistants to muster and organize hundreds of Indians. And since some aspects of the sacrament had to be carried out by a bishop, don Alonso must have spent many hours confirming the local faithful, and then would be off the next day on another mountain track to his next destination.
I assume that he performed the sacrament in the robes of a bishop. We know that expensive silk vestments made in China were imported through Acapulco, but whether don Alonso risked his best outfit in the heat and dust of Guerrero’s mountains we do not know.
[1] Cecilia Bainton, Chris Contillo and Roger Woodham, to whom many thanks.
[2] https://www.loyolapress.com/catholic-resources/sacraments/confirmation/history-and-development-of-sacrament-of-confirmation/
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