The "Conquest of the Americas"

Now that Rockies Nation has had some time to heal from the crushing World Series sweep, it's time for the Herald blog to get back into some serious discussions. Just a heads up, this is a long post...

From time to time, the Herald gets screeners of movies either coming out in theaters or on DVD. Most of the time, they are not box office hits, but low-budget or made-for-TV type family films that companies hope will get some positive press from faith-based papers.

One recent DVD, however, did catch my attention -- "The Other Conquest." Originally released in Mexico in the late 1990s, it has just been re-released on DVD in the U.S. Why a re-release now? We'll get to that in a moment, but the basic plot revolves around the arrival of Cortes and his army and the attempts to Christianize Mexico -- sometimes by brutal force.

The film attempts to explain why some Latin American Catholics and Christians still feel strong ties to their pagan ancestry, causing for an interesting twist on Catholicism. In "The Other Conquest," a Spanish friar is given the task of converting the main character, Topiltzin, whose village is crushed by Cortes' army. Topiltzin is sent off to a monastery, where he develops a devotion to the Virgin Mary but believes himself an Aztec first and foremost in his soul. We see the frustration with the friar's attempt to reach the heart of Topiltzin and compassion with Topiltzin's plight, to the point where the filmmaker asks the question, "Just who is converting who?"

The timing of this re-release is not accidental. High school and college campuses often promote a view of Christianity that makes it seem that it only survived in the Americas by brute force. It's as if Christianity is not realistic and that it duped millions of people over the past 2,000 years. The recent crop of pro-atheism books are evidence of that. "The Mission," one of the finest films ever made about Catholic missionaries in the Americas (even though the filmmaker isn't Catholic) is considered a joke. When Columbus Day recently passed, it was common to see T-shirts around here condeming the holiday. There is a train of thought today that entices people to go back to before Christianity entered the picture, and to embrace the pagan cultures that Christianity converted. I believe this rejection is first and foremost a rejection of the Church's teachings on sex and gender issues, but that's another post.

Now this is not a defense of Cortes and his army's methods. From what we know, they were often brutal and unchristian. There were many other holy men and women who came to the Americas in peace. Some were martyred. But Christianity could not have survived for 500 years if the people did not find some Truth in its teachings. I posed this issue to a friend of mine (who is Mexican and a devout Catholic), and here are some of his thoughts:

As far as Columbus goes…I have no great affinity to the man. If we, as Catholics, want to hold on to an homage for the Spanish for bringing Christ to this continent then we should find out the names of the Franciscans that were on those boats named after Our Lady or the Bishop/Provincial that sent them. Not Columbus…he and the subsequent Conquistadores actions were a scandal to the neophyte and the friar of yesterday and today.

It was Divine Intervention plain and simple that spread our Faith to the masses here in our homeland, in the form of The Virgin of Tepeyac (Guadalupe). The Lord of History sent his faithful and stalwart friars to an unknown land to prepare a path in the wilderness and a teenage girl appeared once again to draw her children near to the Son in her womb.

The paganism of Europe and the Near East has been incorporated (for 2000 years or so) and absorbed by Catholicism so completely that today it is wrongfully considered to be, in the collective psyche of the Western world, completely Christian. Christmas day was hi-jacked from pagan sun worshippers in the 11 century that were celebrating that the shortest day of the year was gone and the days (and the sun) would be getting longer. A Christmas tree is completely pagan and druid in orgin. Easter – Passover – based on the Lunar phases. Even the rituals and secrecy of the early Mass (after being “theologized” by John in Revelations) were influenced and adapted from the near east cult of Mithros brought to Rome by the soldiers.

…segway to today and “mixing” of Catholicism in the Americas with native/pagan beliefs/rites…whether it be Santeria in Mexico, Voodoo in the Carribbean, etc. that has been occurring for only the last 500 years and has not been fully absorbed or incorporated. Europe’s paganism has a 1000 year head start.

I don’t think it is ever a bad thing to reveal beliefs and rituals of different cultures
throughout time …the Truth is the Truth and it is true freedom and over time and
history has saved many from the bondage of many different errant beliefs and
ideologies.

So, what are your thoughts? This is an issue that will not be going away anytime soon, and it is important to have an answer -- especially for those good young men and women who are being led away from Christianity because of this. As we have run our New Age series the last four months or so, we have heard several times the comment that if we get rid of pagan cultures, then get rid of altars, holy water fonts and any other things that Christianity "redeemed" from those cultures.