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| Pope Francis talks to Indian leaders and social workers at the second World Meeting of Popular Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, Thursday, July 9, 2015. During his speech at the meeting, history's first Latin American pope apologized for the sins and "offenses" committed by the Catholic Church against indigenous peoples during the colonial-era conquest of the Americas. |
SANTA CRUZ,
Bolivia (AP) -- Pope Francis apologized Thursday for the sins,
offenses and crimes committed by the Catholic Church against indigenous
peoples during the colonial-era conquest of the Americas, delivering a
powerful mea culpa on the part of the church in the climactic highlight
of his South American pilgrimage.
History's
first Latin American pope "humbly" begged forgiveness during an
encounter in Bolivia with indigenous groups and other activists and in
the presence of Bolivia's first-ever indigenous president, Evo Morales.
Francis
noted that Latin American church leaders in the past had acknowledged
that "grave sins were committed against the native peoples of America in
the name of God." St. John Paul II, for his part, apologized to the
continent's indigenous for the "pain and suffering" caused during the
500 years of the church's presence in the Americas during a 1992 visit
to the Dominican Republic.
But Francis went farther, and said he was doing so with "regret."
"I
would also say, and here I wish to be quite clear, as was St. John Paul
II: I humbly ask forgiveness, not only for the offenses of the church
herself, but also for crimes committed against the native peoples during
the so-called conquest of America," he said to applause from the crowd.
Then
deviating from his prepared script, he added: "I also want for us to
remember the thousands and thousands of priests who strongly opposed the
logic of the sword with the power of the cross. There was sin, and it
was plentiful. But we never apologized, so I now ask for forgiveness.
But where there was sin, and there was plenty of sin, there was also an
abundant grace increased by the men who defended indigenous peoples."
Francis'
apology was met with wild applause from the indigenous and other
grass-roots groups gathered for a world summit of popular movements
whose fight against injustice and social inequality has been championed
by the pope.
"We accept the apologies. What
more can we expect from a man like Pope Francis?" said Adolfo Chavez, a
leader of a lowlands indigenous group. "It's time to turn the page and
pitch in to start anew. We indigenous were never lesser beings."
The
apology was significant given the controversy that has erupted in the
United States over Francis' planned canonization of the 18th century
Spanish priest Junipero Serra, who set up missions across California.
Native Americans contend Serra brutally converted indigenous people to
Christianity, wiping out villages in the process, and have opposed his
canonization. The Vatican insists Serra defended natives from colonial
abuses.
Francis' apology was also significant
given the controversy that blew up the last time a pope visited the
continent. Benedict XVI drew heated criticism when, during a 2007 visit
to Brazil, he defended the church's campaign to Christianize indigenous
peoples. He said the Indians of Latin America had been "silently
longing" to become Christians when Spanish and Portuguese conquerors
violently took over their lands.
"In effect,
the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve
an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition
of a foreign culture," Benedict told the continent's bishops.
Amid
an outcry from indigenous groups, Benedict subsequently acknowledged
that "shadows accompanied the work of evangelizing" the continent and
said European colonizers inflicted "sufferings and injustices" on
indigenous populations. He didn't apologize, however.
The
Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, said that Francis wrote
the speech on his own and that the apology for the sins, offenses and
crimes of the church was a "particularly important declaration."
Church
officials have long insisted Catholic missionaries protected indigenous
peoples from the abuses of military colonizers and were often punished
by European colonial powers as a result. Francis' own Jesuit order
developed missions across the continent, educating the indigenous and
turning their communities into
organized Christian-Indian societies. The
Jesuits were expelled in the 17th century.
Mexican
Bishop Raul Vera, who attended the summit where Francis made the
apology, said the church was essentially a passive participant in
allowing natives to become enslaved under the Spanish "encomienda"
system, by which the Spanish king granted land in conquered territories
to those who settled there. Indians were allowed to live on the
haciendas as long as they worked them.
"It's
evident that the church did not defend against it with all its efforts.
It allowed it to be imposed," Vera told The Associated Press earlier
Thursday.
He acknowledged that John Paul had
previously asked forgiveness for the church's sins against indigenous.
But he said Francis' apology was particularly poignant given the
setting.
Campesino leader Amandina Quispe, of
Anta, Peru, who attended the grass-roots summit, said the church still
holds lands it should give back to Andean natives. The former seat of
the Inca empire, conquered by
Spaniards in the 16th century, is an
example.
"The church stole our land and tore
down our temples in Cuzco and then it built its own churches - and now
it charges admission to visit them," she said.
Francis'
apology was not the first. After his 1992 apology, John Paul II issued a
sweeping but vague apology for the Catholic Church's sins of the past
during the church's 2000 Jubilee. A year later, he apologized
specifically for missionary abuses against aborigines in Oceania. He did
so in the first ever papal email.
During the
speech, the longest and most important of Francis' week-long,
three-nation South American trip, the pope touched on some of the key
priorities of his pontificate: the need to change an unjust global
economic system that excludes the poor and replace it with a
"communitarian economy" involving the "fitting distribution" of the
Earth's resources.
"Working for a just
distribution of the fruits of the Earth and human labor is not mere
philanthropy. It's a moral obligation," he said.
He
ended the speech with a fierce condemnation of the world's governments
for what he called "cowardice" in defending the Earth. Echoing his
environmental encyclical of last month, the pope said the Earth "is
being pillaged, laid waste and harmed with impunity" while "one
international summit after another takes place without any significant
result."
He urged the activists present to "keep up your struggle."
It
was a message he articulated earlier in the day when he denounced the
"throwaway" culture of today's society that discards anyone who is
unproductive. He made the comments as he celebrated his first public
Mass in Bolivia, South America's poorest country.
The
government declared a national holiday so workers and students could
attend the Mass, which featured prayers in Guarani and Aimara, two of
Bolivia's indigenous languages, and an altar carved from wood by
artisans of the Chiquitano people.
In a
blending of the native and new, the famously unpretentious pope changed
into his vestments for the Mass in a nearby Burger King.
