Persecution of Christians in Mexico

The modern history of anticlericalism has often been characterized by deep conflicts between the government and the Catholic Church, sometimes including outright persecution of Catholics in Mexico.

Beginning of anticlericalism and persecution

In one form or another, anticlericalism has been a factor in Mexican politics since independence from Spain, which is attributable to the frequent change in government and those governments' eagerness to access wealth in the form of the property of the Church.[1] Mexico was born after its independence as a confessional state. Its first constitution was enacted in 1824 and stated in the article 3 that the religion of the nation was and would perpetually be Roman Catholic-it also prohibited any other religion.[2] After the Revolution of Ayutla, nearly all of the top figures in the government were Freemasons and fierce anticlericalists.[3] In 1857 a Constitution was adopted which attacked the property rights and possessions of the Church. After a civil war and the dominance by the supporters of that Constitution under Benito Juárez, the supporters of tradition backed an ill-advised Mexican Empire supported by the French.[1] When the Emperor Maximillian was deposed and killed, the country descended into a series of anti-clerical governments.[1] After the rule of Porfirio Díaz who was relatively moderate in his stance toward the Church, an increasingly violent and extreme anticlericalism erupted.[1] In 1917, a new Constitution was enacted, hostile to the Church and religion, which promulgated a draconian anti-clericalism of the sort seen in France during the Revolution.[1] The new Mexican Constitution was hostile to Church as a consequence of the support given by the High Mexican Catholic Clergy to the dictatorship of Victoriano Huerta.[4][5][6][7][8] The 1917 Constitution outlawed teaching by the Church, gave control over Church matters to the state, put all Church property at the disposal of the state, outlawed religious orders, outlawed foreign-born priests, gave states the power to limit or eliminate priests in their territory, deprived priests of the right to vote or hold office, prohibited Catholic organizations which advocated public policy, prohibited religious publications from commenting on public policy, prohibited clergy from religious celebrations and from wearing clerical garb outside of a church and deprived citizens of the right to a trial for violations of these provisions.[9][10] One political scientist stated that the gist of the 1917 constitution was to "effectively outlaw the Roman Catholic Church and other religious denominations".[11] Another article of the Constitution emboldened Marxist and then Communist labor unions which subsequently incited even more anti-religious governments.[12]

Recent President Vicente Fox stated "After 1917, Mexico was led by anti-Catholic Freemasons who tried to evoke the anticlerical spirit of popular indigenous President Benito Juarez of the 1880s. But the military dictators of the 1920s were a lot more savage than Juarez."[13] Fox goes on to recount how priests were killed for trying to perform the sacraments, altars were desecrated by soldiers and freedom of religion outlawed by generals.[13]

Calles presidency and Cristero War

As a reaction against the strict enforcement of the above anti-clerical articles in the constitution of 1917 in Mexico, specifically Article 130, armed conflict broke out in the Cristero War (also known as the Cristiada) of 1926 to 1929. This was a civil war between Catholic rebels called Cristeros and the anti-clerical Mexican government of the time that was mainly localized in central Western states in Mexico.

The Cristero War came about in response to the anti-clerical laws of the Mexican Constitution of 1917, and its interpretation by the "violent atheist" President Plutarco Elías Calles.[14] Though conflict between church and state marked the presidency of Álvaro Obregón (1920–1924), who "accused the clergy of being insincere and of producing conflict" but "spoke of Jesus Christ as 'the greatest socialist who has been known to Humanity'",[15] it was with Calles' election in 1924 that anti-clerical laws were stringently applied throughout the country. Calles also added his own anti-clerical legislation, including a requirement that prohibited priests from ministering unless licensed by the state.[14] State officials then began to limit the number of priests so that vast areas of the population were left with no priest at all.[14] After a zealous persecution of unlicensed ministry, decrepit churches were soon expropriated for use as garages, museums and the like, and the Mexican bishops, deported or underground, as a last resort of protest suspended all remaining ministry and urged the people to protest the persecution of their faith.[1] Calles presided over the worst persecution of Catholics and clergy in the history of Mexico, including the killing of hundreds of priests and other clergy.

One contemporary is quoted as saying that "while President Calles is sane on all other matters, he completely loses control of himself when the matter of religion comes up, becomes livid in the face and pounds the table to express his hatred."[16] Wearing clerical garb outside of churches was outlawed during his rule and priests exercising their right of political speech could be imprisoned for five years.

On November 18, 1926, Pope Pius XI promulgated the encyclical Iniquis afflictisque decrying the severe persecution of the faithful in Mexico and the deprivation of the rights of the faithful and the Church.[17]

The formal rebellion began on January 1, 1927 with the rebels calling themselves Cristeros because they felt they were fighting for Christ himself. The Cristeros' battle cry was ¡Viva Cristo Rey! ("Long live Christ the King!"). When Jalisco federal commander General Jesús Maria Ferreira moved on the rebels, he calmly stated that "it will be less a campaign than a hunt." Just as the Cristeros began to hold their own against the federal forces, the rebellion was ended by diplomatic means, in large part due to the pressure of United States Ambassador Dwight Whitney Morrow. The war had claimed the lives of some 90,000: 56,882 on the federal side, 30,000 Cristeros. Numerous civilians and Cristeros were killed in anticlerical raids, while Cristeros killed atheist teachers and people suspected of supporting the government, and even blew up a passenger train.

The persecution was worst under the rule of Tabasco's notorious governor Tomás Garrido Canabal. Garrido's rule, which marked the apogee of Mexican anti-clericalism, was supported by the Radical Socialist Party of Tabasco (PRST) of which he was the leader. In 1916 his predecessor Francisco J. Múgica had restored the name of the state capital Villa Hermosa de San Juan Bautista ("Beautiful Town of St. John the Baptist") to Villahermosa ("Beautifultown").[18] Garrido Canabal founded several fascist paramilitary organizations "that terrorized Roman Catholics",[19] most notably the so-called "Red Shirts".[19][20]

The Catholic Church has recognized several of those killed in connection with the Cristero rebellion as martyrs. Perhaps the best-known is Miguel Pro, SJ. This Jesuit priest was shot dead by firing squad on November 23, 1927, without benefit of a trial, on trumped-up charges. The Calles government hoped to use images of the execution to scare the rebels into surrender, but the photos had the opposite effect. Upon seeing the photos, which the government had printed in all the newspapers, the Cristeros were inspired with a desire to follow Father Pro into martyrdom for Christ. His beatification occurred in 1988. On May 21, 2000, Pope John Paul II canonized a group of 25 martyrs from this period (they were previously beatified on November 22, 1992.) For the most part, these were priests who did not take up arms, but refused to leave their flocks, and were killed by federal forces. Thirteen additional victims of the anti-Catholic regime have been declared martyrs by the Catholic Church, paving the way to their beatification. These are primarily lay people, including the 14-year-old José Sánchez del Río. The requirement that they did not take up arms, which was applied to the priest martyrs, does not apply to the lay people, though it had to be shown that they were taking up arms in self-defense.

On September 29, 1932 Pope Pius XI issued a second encyclical on the persecution, Acerba Animi. The effects of the war on the Church were profound. Between 1926 and 1934 at least 40 priests were killed.[21] Where there were 4,500 priests serving the people before the rebellion, in 1934 there were only 334 priests licensed by the government to serve fifteen million people, the rest having been eliminated by emigration, expulsion and assassination.[21][22] By 1935, 17 states had no priest at all.[23]

Mid-twentieth century

As Mexico entered the mid-twentieth century the more violent oppression of earlier in the century had waned, but the Church remained severely suppressed. By 1940 it "legally had no corporate existence, no real estate, no schools, no monasteries or convents, no foreign priests, no right to defend itself publicly or in the courts, and no hope that its legal and actual situations would improve. Its clergy were forbidden to wear clerical garb, to vote, to celebrate public religious ceremonies, and to engage in politics," but the restrictions were not always enforced.[24]

Open hostility toward the Church largely ceased with the election of Manuel Ávila Camacho (1940–46), who agreed, in exchange for the Church's efforts to maintain peace, to nonenforcement of most of the anticlerical provisions, an exception being Article 130, Section 9, which deprived the Church of the right of political speech, the right to vote, and the right of free political association.[25]

Removal of many anticlerical provisions from the constitution

In 1991 President Salinas proposed the removal of most of the anticlerical provisions from the constitution, a move which passed the legislature in 1992.[25]

Martyrs

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Ehler, Sidney Z. Church and State Through the Centuries p. 579, (1967 Biblo & Tannen Publishers) ISBN 0-8196-0189-6
  2. ↑ Federal Constitution of the United Mexican States (1824)
  3. ↑ Werner, Michael S., Concise Encyclopedia of Mexico, p. 88, Taylor and Francis 2001
  4. ↑ John Lear (2001). Workers, neighbors, and citizens: the revolution in Mexico City. U of Nebraska Press. p. 261. ISBN 9780803279971.
  5. ↑ Ignacio C. Enríques (1915). The religious question in Mexico, number 7. I.C. Enriquez,. p. 10.
  6. ↑ Robert P. Millon (1995). Zapata: The Ideology of a Peasant Revolutionary. International Publishers Co. p. 23. ISBN 9780717807109.
  7. ↑ Carlo de Fornaro, John Farley (1916). What the Catholic Church Has Done to Mexico. Latin-American News Association. pp. 13–14.
  8. ↑ Peter Gran (1996). Beyond Eurocentrism: a new view of modern world history. Syracuse University Press. p. 165. ISBN 9780815626923.
  9. ↑ Ehler, Sidney Z. Church and State Through the Centuries p. 579-580, (1967 Biblo & Tannen Publishers) ISBN 0-8196-0189-6
  10. ↑ Needler, Martin C. Mexican Politics: The Containment of Conflict p. 50, Greenwood Publishing Group, 1995
  11. ↑ Toft, Monica Duffy, Daniel Philpott and Timothy Samuel Shah, God's Century: Resurgent Religion and Global Politics, p. 171, W.W. Norton & Co. 2011
  12. ↑ Ehler, Sidney Z. Church and State Through the Centuries p. 580, (1967 Biblo & Tannen Publishers) ISBN 0-8196-0189-6
  13. 1 2 Fox, Vicente and Rob Allyn Revolution of Hope p. 17, Viking, 2007
  14. 1 2 3 Ehler, Sidney Z. Church and State Through the Centuries p. 580, (1967 Biblo & Tannen Publishers) ISBN 0-8196-0189-6
  15. ↑ Edward J. Berbusse, S.J., "The Unofficial Intervention of the United States in Mexico's Religious Crisis, 1926-1930". The Americas 23.1 (July 1966): 31.
  16. ↑ Qtd. Edward J. Berbusse, S.J., "The Unofficial Intervention of the United States in Mexico's Religious Crisis, 1926-1930". The Americas 23.1 (July 1966): 37.
  17. ↑ [ON THE PERSECUTION OF THE CHURCH IN MEXICO http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius11/P11INIQU.HTM] Papal Encyclicals Online 1926
  18. ↑ Enciclopedia de Municipios de México, Tabasco-Centro
  19. 1 2 "Garrido Canabal, Tomás". The Columbia Encyclopedia Sixth Edition (2005).
  20. ↑ Stan Ridgeway, "Monoculture, Monopoly, and the Mexican Revolution" Mexican Studies / Estudios Mexicanos 17.1 (Winter, 2001): 167.
  21. 1 2 Van Hove, Brian Blood-Drenched Altars Faith & Reason 1994
  22. ↑ Scheina, Robert L. Latin America's Wars: The Age of the Caudillo, 1791-1899 p. 33 (2003 Brassey's) ISBN 1-57488-452-2
  23. ↑ Ruiz, Ramón Eduardo Triumphs and Tragedy: A History of the Mexican People p.393 (1993 W. W. Norton & Company) ISBN 0-393-31066-3
  24. ↑ Mabry, Donald J. "Mexican Anticlerics, Bishops, Cristeros, the Devout during the 1920s: A Scholarly Debate." Journal of Church and State 20, 1: 82 (1978).
  25. 1 2 Mexico: Church State Relations Country Studies Series by Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress June 1996
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