How Did The Catholic Church Influence Latin America

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The Catholic Church has been a big influential force in the Latin America. It influence can be found since the beginning when Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas. On the first island that they landed, Hispaniola or now Haiti/Dominican Republic, was were the church started to spread its influences. Among their priorities, the first of Church was stablish in the new continent. The other priority was to be a conscience to the “conquistadores” or conquerors about fair treatment of the Indians that would be become new subjects to the church and protect them from slaves’ treatment. One example to illustrate this is when the Dominican fair Antonio Montesinos warmed the conquerors of that they practice of hurting the innocent will sent them to damnation. (Winn, 42) As time passed, these conquerors and more explored more land in the Americas which allowed the Catholic Church to spread to what would later become different new countries. There, the church intervene with people’s lives in things like: education, charity, alliances with business, protection, feeding the poor among other things. When we think about the Catholic Church, we need to think about its priests and about the influence that they hold of the church itself and of its people. The history of the Catholic Church in Latin America had many important figures. The figures which we will talk about in this text are: Bartolomé de Las Casas, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, and Gustavo Gutiérrez. I believe that these three clerics have really important role to play when it comes to the history of Latin America. The first figure is Bartolome de Las Casas. …show more content…
He came from a novel family that French and possibly Jewish roots. He studied letter and Latin, and later studied canon law until he got a “Licenciatura” or Bachelor’s Degree in it. Because he father was a merchant, he was able to come in Columbus second trip to the Americas where he was able to live in both the Hispaniola and Cuba for about a decade. During this time, he attended military expeditions where he was witnessed the horror of what happened to the indigenous people and the part that the “encomienda” system played in these horrors. There he saw families being destroyed and also the enslavement of them. These experiences contributed to Las Casa what would become his life goal of helping and protecting the indigenous people. Towards this goal, he renounced his encomienda which set the mark to his fight to protect the Indians. He later became a priest, and “In keeping with his Crown-appointed position as ‘Universal Protector of all of the Indigenous in the Indies,’ he proposed significant reform plans pertaining to the islands of Hispaniola, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, and Cuba (1516); a peasant immigration proposal (1518); and a peaceful colonization project at Cumana (1521) [which failed. But] in 1522, Las Casas joined the Dominican mendicant friars: the Order of Preachers [ to correct this].” (Orique, 326) At the seminary in Santo Domingo (Hispaniola), he was taught by the Order in various disciplines. Out of this this new knowledge he wrote The Only Way where he explained that the only way that God intended his people to receive the true religion is by using reason to win with will in a way that it will become a gentle invitation. Dominican fair Las Casas, continued his search of justice for the indigenous people in Nicaragua, Guatemala, and Mexico. His approach to this was more to use his juridical knowledge. But “Las Casas was both theoretical and practical in his pursuit of a “total remedy” for the unjust situation in the Indies. For example, in 1536, he was instrumental in the Mexican Episcopal conference producing three significant documents on the subjects of the Amerindian Church, the issue of slavery, and the method of evangelization. In 1537, he pioneered another experiment of peaceful evangelization in Tierra de Guerra (Land of War) and did so with such success that this Guatemalan territory was renamed Vera Paz (True Peace).” (Orique, 326) With his petition for “total remedy”, a “New Law of the Indies” was created in 1542 which disallowed to inherit “encomiendas”, prohibit slavery and any future conquests. Until he died, Las Casas was constantly writing papers and publishing

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