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PENITENTES AND POLITICS
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
2:09:00 AM EDT
[Information taken mostly from, Marta Wiegle, Brothers of Light, Brothers of Blood; The Penitentes of the Southwest, UNM Press, Albuqurque, NM, 1976, pp. 300, passim.]
During the lifetime of Padre Martinez, Taos and northern New Mexico in general was highly politicized without necessarily being polarized by partisan politics. Moradas then, as churches and lodges today, tended to be a convenient meeting place to communicate. “The majority of the Brotherhood in New Mexico was traditionally supposed to have been Republican….most of the Brothers east of the Sangre de Cristo Range being Democrats, and those to the west, Republicans. However, no careful study has ever proved or disproved such popular notions.”
A Democratic partisan, “apparently the hermano mayor of Abiquiú,” wrote to a Las Vegas printer at the beginning of the twentieth century to express his desire for “a slate of Democratic candidates for county office to break the stronghold of Catronist Republicans.” Mary Austin reports that in the 1920s, “a member of the Republican Committee estimated that practically ninety-five percent of the Spanish-speaking population of New Mexico had been at sometime in their lives members of the Penitentes.”
San Miguel County succeeded Taos County as the “vigorous center of political activity, whether connected with the Penitentes or not. Other strong Penitente counties were perhaps equally involved in Territorial politics and judicial process, but public concern about Brotherhood power seems to have shifted from Taos…by the beginning of the twentieth century.” Also in San Miguel County, an older cofradía complained in early 1946 to civil authority about a younger cofradía usurping their name, and consequently causing confusion. The older was called “La Fraternididad de Nuestro Padre Jesus de Nazareno del Condado de San Miguel, Territorio de Nuevo Mexico,” and the newly incorporated cofradía was called by the very similar name of “Concilio Original de Nuestro Padre Jesus Nazareno, de Sheridan, Condado de San Miguel, Nuevo Mexico.” The tension may have been about more than nomenclature, but also about politics. The former cofradía was “reputed to be solidly Republican, the newer Democratic.”
It seems that the younger group was “anxious to acquire power within the Brotherhood and the county. These allegations were never publicly substantiated, but the split between groups of Democrats and the traditionally Republican moradas apparently had precedent within the county…” The Archbishop wisely suggested that a name change take place for both within a reasonable time. The former would become “El Concilio del Centro de Nuestra Señora de Los Dolores,” and the latter “El Conciio del Centro de Sangre de Cristo.”
Father Emile Barrat spoke of his Costilla parish and missions, in the county north of Taos and on the Colorado side of the border between New Mexico and Colorado that “used to belong to the political center of Taos.” He went on to explain that politics is now explicitly excluded from all church-sponsored meetings.
[The blog, sadly, did not reproduce the footnote page references to Marta Weigle's classic work on the Penitentes of the Southwest, Brothers of Light...]
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2:09:00 AM EDT
PENITENTES AND POLITICS
[Information taken mostly from, Marta Wiegle, Brothers of Light, Brothers of Blood; The Penitentes of the Southwest, UNM Press, Albuqurque, NM, 1976, pp. 300, passim.]
During the lifetime of Padre Martinez, Taos and northern New Mexico in general was highly politicized without necessarily being polarized by partisan politics. Moradas then, as churches and lodges today, tended to be a convenient meeting place to communicate. “The majority of the Brotherhood in New Mexico was traditionally supposed to have been Republican….most of the Brothers east of the Sangre de Cristo Range being Democrats, and those to the west, Republicans. However, no careful study has ever proved or disproved such popular notions.”
A Democratic partisan, “apparently the hermano mayor of Abiquiú,” wrote to a Las Vegas printer at the beginning of the twentieth century to express his desire for “a slate of Democratic candidates for county office to break the stronghold of Catronist Republicans.” Mary Austin reports that in the 1920s, “a member of the Republican Committee estimated that practically ninety-five percent of the Spanish-speaking population of New Mexico had been at sometime in their lives members of the Penitentes.”
San Miguel County succeeded Taos County as the “vigorous center of political activity, whether connected with the Penitentes or not. Other strong Penitente counties were perhaps equally involved in Territorial politics and judicial process, but public concern about Brotherhood power seems to have shifted from Taos…by the beginning of the twentieth century.” Also in San Miguel County, an older cofradía complained in early 1946 to civil authority about a younger cofradía usurping their name, and consequently causing confusion. The older was called “La Fraternididad de Nuestro Padre Jesus de Nazareno del Condado de San Miguel, Territorio de Nuevo Mexico,” and the newly incorporated cofradía was called by the very similar name of “Concilio Original de Nuestro Padre Jesus Nazareno, de Sheridan, Condado de San Miguel, Nuevo Mexico.” The tension may have been about more than nomenclature, but also about politics. The former cofradía was “reputed to be solidly Republican, the newer Democratic.”
It seems that the younger group was “anxious to acquire power within the Brotherhood and the county. These allegations were never publicly substantiated, but the split between groups of Democrats and the traditionally Republican moradas apparently had precedent within the county…” The Archbishop wisely suggested that a name change take place for both within a reasonable time. The former would become “El Concilio del Centro de Nuestra Señora de Los Dolores,” and the latter “El Conciio del Centro de Sangre de Cristo.”
Father Emile Barrat spoke of his Costilla parish and missions, in the county north of Taos and on the Colorado side of the border between New Mexico and Colorado that “used to belong to the political center of Taos.” He went on to explain that politics is now explicitly excluded from all church-sponsored meetings.
[The blog, sadly, did not reproduce the footnote page references to Marta Weigle's classic work on the Penitentes of the Southwest, Brothers of Light...]
Written by juanrvi Blog about this entry |
Add to del.icio.us | digg this
