OCTOBER, 2011HISTORY 429 , HISPANIC FRONTIER IN

NORTH AMERICA

Conquistadors of the Spirit

The Orders of the Catholic Church

AugustiniansFranciscansDominicansJesuits

St Francis1235Tempera on woodChurch of San Francesco, Pescia

Franciscans

First Franciscan came with Columbus on his Second Voyage.

Accompanied expeditions such as those of Pánfilo de Narváez, Hernando de Soto, and Francisco Vázquez de Coronado, with the ideal “that the conquest be a Christian apostolic one and not a butchery.” (p. 94, Weber, text).

Possessed, like other orders, but especially powerful among Franciscans, a Millenarian vision of the world.

Dominicans

Antonio de Montesinos, Statue, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

Saint Dominic (Spanish: Domingo), also known as Dominic of Osma, often called Dominic de Guzmán and Domingo de Guzmán Garcés (1170 – August 6, 1221) was the founder of the Friars Preachers, popularly called the Dominicans or Order of Preachers (OP), a Catholic religious order. Dominic is the patron saint of astronomers and the Dominican Republic.

Jesuits

St. Ignatius Loyola and the Society of Jesus

Saint Ignatius of Loyola (Spanish: Ignacio López de Loyola) (October 23, 1491 – July 31, 1556) was the principal founder and first Superior General of the Society of Jesus.[2]

The compiler of the Spiritual Exercises, Ignatius was described by Pope Benedict XVI as being above all a man of God, who gave the first place of his life to God, and a man of profound prayer.[3] He was very active in fighting the Protestant Reformation and promoting the subsequent Counter-Reformation.

Early Approaches by Franciscans and Dominicans, 1

Lucas Vazquez de Ayllon expedition to the Georgia/Carolina coast 1526 carried with it Dominicans, including the famous Antonio de Montesinos, killed by Indians a few years later in Venezuela.

Francisco Coronado’s expedition north from Mexico in 1539 carried with it six Franciscans, two of whom were left behind in 1542 when the expedition returned to Mexico. Both became martyrs to the Pueblo Indians.

Early Approaches by Franciscans and Dominicans, 2

De Soto’s expedition carried several priests, but the brutality of the entrada undermined any attempts to evangelize and convert.

Postcard view of First Mass at St. Augustine

Jesuits in the Settlement of Florida

Jesuits, led by Juan Baptista de Segura, led a mission to the Chesapeake Bay region in 1570 (from Santa Elena) and actually planted a mission very close to where the English placed Jamestown decades later.

Jesuits hoped to convert the Algonquin, but “chafing from Jesuit insults to their religion and culture, a group of natives…put the outsiders to death.” (p. 72)

[Great image on p. 73 of text; see next page]

Successes and Failures in Florida, 1

Early fortifications established by Menendez, with friars appointed to them, were destroyed. In 1568, a French privateer destroyed San Mateo built on site of French Fort Caroline, sacked by Menendez. Spanish survivors all hanged.

Small settlements est. by Menendez at Tampa and Biscayne Bay destroyed by Indians.

St. Augustine barely survived.After the Chesapeake Bay disaster, Jesuits

abandoned Florida entirely!

Successes and Failures in Florida, 2

While Menendez tried to fulfill his orders, which included “the good treatment and conversion to our Holy Catholic Faith of the natives,” he was undermined by the unruly behavior of the soldiers and the missionary Franciscans who insulated local Calusa Indian beliefs and practices.

Menendez even “married” the ugly daughter of one of the chiefs!

Menendez died in 1574 and with his death much of the energy to sustain and maintain the colony.

Successes and Failures in Florida, 3

Santa Elena had been abandoned in 1576 and St. Augustine was almost abandoned in 1608, but Franciscan missionaries persuaded him that that would mean abandoning Indian converts, all this, and in New Mexico, supported by the Crown.

Royal Orders for New Discoveries of 1573

With the effective end of the Conquest, mendicant missionaries were sent further into the exploration and pacification of new lands, “preaching the gospel…is the principal purpose for which we order new discoveries and settlements to be made.” (p. 95) Royal Orders prohibited conquest or violence against Indians for any purpose.

Franciscans, Dominicans and others were displaced in the more heavily settled Indies—Mexico and Peru—by the secular, diocesan clergy.

Franciscans on the Spanish Frontier

In 1573 Franciscans began sustained missionary work in Florida, and by 1598 Franciscans returned to New Mexico with Juan de Oñate.

With the exception of Jesuit missions among the Pimas into southern Arizona, the Franciscans monopolized missionary work for the next three centuries in North America, from Florida to California.

Franciscans in New Mexico

Papal Bull of 1537, Sublimis Deus

“Indians are truly men capable of understanding the Catholic faith” became a cornerstone of Franciscan theological approach to the Indians of the frontier. Sublimis Deus may in fact have been based on a book written by B. de Las Casas, The Only Way, but that for another book.

A Terrestrial Paradise

Franciscans not only wished to save souls, but to transform or reshape natives’ cultures.

When basically expelled from central Mexico and replaced by diocesan Church, they turned to the frontier to realize their “terrestrial paradise.”

Franciscan Movements into Florida and New Mexico

Franciscans began in earnest in Florida in 1573 and back into New Mexico among the Pueblos after 1581, and especially after 1598 with Juan de Oñate, building missions and “civilizing” the natives.

Without heavy secular competition in the North American frontier, or members of other religious orders, and with support from the Crown, it seemed an ideal setting.

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History”

In a book edited with contributions by Erick Langer and Robert H. Jackson, they explored The New Latin American Mission History (Lincoln, Nebraska 1995).

The basic element is a restructuring of the focus, off the missionaries and, instead, on the Indians, which gives a sometimes rather critical view of the missions, as opposed to the one developed several generations ago by Herbert E. Bolton and his students.

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History” 2

As they stated in their introduction, “ a change in the writing of mission history began only in the 1980s…a new generation of scholars has redefined the study of the missions, giving more attention to the Indian perspective of mission life, the larger political and economic context of colonial and republican missions, and the impact of mission life on converts.” (p. xi)

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History” 3

David Sweet’s “The Ibero-American Frontier Mission in Native American History” is immensely useful in framing the argument.

Bolton’s argument was the missions’ goals were to convert, to civilize, and to exploit the Indian population. Bolton emphasized the “civilizing” function of the missions. This meant teaching the Indians how to be good vassals, how to work and be productive, and thus support the missions.

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History” 4

Bolton envisioned Spanish colonial policy as humanitarian, and the “essence of the mission was discipline—religious, moral, social, and industrial, which it afforded.” (p. 5) Soldiers in frontier presidios attached to the missions often supplied much of the discipline to maintain order and obedience.

After a brief analysis of Bolton’s argument—”he admired the frontier mission for having spread the faith and taught the Indians good manners, the

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History”5

Rudiments of European crafts, agriculture and even self-government,” then Sweet turns to “Reframing the Discussion.” (pp. 6-7)

Here are the main points (pp. 11 ff) under the general title of “Indian life in the frontier missions: elements of constraint” (this is not a pretty list!)

Disease and chronic illnessMalnutritionRegimentation

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History” 6

Discipline and PunishmentDeculturationInfantilizationAlienation from natureOn the other hand, there were some elements

of opportunity for Indians in the frontier missions:

SurvivalNew tools, cultigens and techniquesNew forms of community

A Pause, to consider the “New Mission History” 7

Appropriation of ChristianityResistance

More on Missionary Realities, 1

What were some of the advantages the Franciscans enjoyed in North America? Think govt. subsidies, less competition, and Royal Orders of 1573. 

How did the governers and soldiers demonstrate dramatically and publicly that the friars were exceedingly important in Spanish culture and religion?

 Alonso de Benavides wrote much of the Franciscans in New Mexico. Did he attribute anything to divine intercession? What were some of the examples? 

Who was the "Lady in Blue?" How do YOU judge these appearances and miracles?

 Where, generally, were the Franciscan missions located in Florida in the seventeenth century? Were they large missions? If not, describe some of their salient features.

More on Missionary Realities, 2

 Useful quote: "On the southern fringes of seventeenth-century North America, then, a small number of Spanish preachers--seldom exceeding fifty at a time in either Florida or New Mexico--made rapid inroads into the communal and individual lives of large numbers of natives." (Weber, p. 105) 

Another one: "Christian doctrine and social behaviour were inextricably linked in the minds of Spaniards, who had also sought to make converts from Islam dress, cook, eat, walk, and talk like Spaniards." Ibid. What would we call this today? Cultural imperialism? Brain washing?

 Why did the Franciscans feel they had to deal a "body blow at the whole structure of native society?" (p. 106) 

Did Franciscans search for martyrdom?  What were some of the more practical strategies in the cultural and

spiritual transformation of the native Americans that the Franciscans employed? You might wish to think of gifts, conversions, moving about, native leaders, children, linguistics, bilingual texts, Castilian, for example. 

More on Missionary Realities, 3

Another quote with some spice: "...a Pueblo Indian had asked 'if we who are Christians caused so much harm and violence, why should they become Christians?'" Why indeed?

 How often did the caravans or iron-tired wagons replenish the missions of New Mexico with goods and wares from New Spain? What about the case of Florida?

 Once converts were made freely, and baptism administered, did the Franciscans use any type of coercion to ensure orthodox behaviour? Think stocks, incarceration, and whipping for starters. Add smashing, burning and confiscating objects sacred to the natives.

Interesting quote #4 (?): "Until the end of the Spanish era in North America, the padres defended the practice of flogging disobedient Indians, and to atone for their sins they whipped themselves as well. 'You Christians are so crazy...flogging yourselves like crazy people in the streets, shedding blood...." Weber, p. 113. 

More on Missionary Realities, 4

On what grounds did Franciscans defend corporal punishment and force? Think, for starters, rescuing brutes from barbarism, preventing individuals from infecting the community, saving their own souls by preventing sins. 

Why did many natives welcome the missionaries? Defense against predatory Indians or Spaniards perhaps? Access to Spanish trade and gifts? Access to awesome spiritual power?

 How did disease figure in the latter power the first Franciscans seemed able to invoke over the natives? Did sexual abstinence--such as practiced by the Franciscans--seem to convey some power?

More on Missionary Realities, 5

 Did the natives synthesize or syncretize their native religions and Christian ritual and images? Or were they kept by and large separate, instead adopting one set, but keeping the other in tact?

 How were the native cultures transformed in other ways? Think nutritional value of foods, European crops, diet, polygamy.

 How did some Indians turn on the missionary fathers? Mice meat, urine, and corn tortillas?

 In the end, did the Spaniards successfully Hispanicize and Christianize the Indians?

"Whatever their spiritual successes, then, missionaries failed to advance permanently, defend effectively, or Hispanicize deeply North American frontiers in the seventeenth century." Weber, p. 121.

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