Religious Resistance during Europeanization
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Religious Resistance during Europeanization
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This image illustrates a post conquest society showing a Jesus Christ-like figure centered in the middle of the page as his viewers are scattered around him. While showing religion in an ideal frame, life after the conquest was nothing an easy one for the indigenous. Europeans invaded Mexico and incorporated their culture into a society they didn’t know of before. The arrival of Augustinians began in the 1530s nearly ten years post conquest and settled in Chalma, Malinalco, Mexico State. Much like the Spanish, Augustinians traveled carrying out tasks at hand handed down from the church. As shown in the picture Augustinian friars, peasants, and children gaze at “Santo Christo de Chalma” hanging from a cross in resemblance to Jesus’ second coming in Christianity. Although this shows a hopeful society of “New Spain’ it does not illustrate the reality of indigenous resistance. Mexico struggles to maintain the indigenous population through constant battles of power dominance. Enforcing Europeanization meant destroying the indigenous homeland to shape society into a more advanced country. By doing so, Augustinians sought to reconstruct sacred spaces used for indigenous spiritual practices and restructured them to create more churches. In this case, Chalma was home to a well-known sacred space before it was nearly destroyed during the era of Europeanization. Chalma, Malinalco, Mexico State is a small village where people would gather to practice their spirituality and engage in fellowship with their peers in a ritualistic manner. Deep into the village, a cave is located near the end of the trail to Chalma where indigenous fellowship occurs. In times of distress they sought refuge to hide from the horrors the conquest had made. Once Europeans invaded these places anger brewed within the Native community strengthening resistance towards assimilation. Europeans sought to destroy Mexico’s population through Mexico’s land and resources in preparation to build an empire based on divine right. This end goal would cost the indigenous to nearly loose the most sacred parts of their culture, their spirituality and sacred spaces if they continued to accept their new way of life. The moment Europeans received word about the existing caves and sacred spaces surrounding Mexico’s religious history, tension between the Natives and their oppressors would reach its breaking point. Modernizing Mexico became a series of forceful attacks against the Natives in an attempt to erase their language, spirituality, and cultural practices to establish a society based on unjust religious reasoning.
Sardó, Joaquín. Relacion Historica y Moral De La Portentosa Imagen De N. Sr. Jesucristo Crucificado Aparecida En Una De Las Cuevas De S. Miguel De Chalma: Hoy Real Convento y Santuario De Este Nombre . Con Los Compendios De Las Vidas De Los Dos Venerables Religiosos Legos y Primeros Anacoretas De Este Santo Desierto, F. Bartolome De Jesus Maria, y F. Juan De San Josef. México: Impresa en casa de Arizpe, 1810.
"Aparicion del Santo Christo de Chalma"