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The colonizer, without realizing it, also contributes to the reinforcement of vindictive historical memory through his actions, interpretations and testimonies during the violence of colonial rule and, in this context, religious indoctrination.
Contrary to the ignorance of the military hosts, the religious people who accompanied the invasion had centuries of traditions of studying, compiling and protecting information produced by humanity and were used to recording and informing the hierarchy in accordance with the discipline of the Catholic Church. The effectiveness of using subjective and material violence to spread Christianity in towns. Ideology and economic interests were closely linked to the relationship between religious invaders and colonized peoples.
Tomás Gage, an Irish Dominican friar, arrived in Guatemala 100 years after Alvarado’s invasion in 1524 and concentrated religious activities in the Cow Valley, Mixco, Pinula, and Amatitlán, leaving behind a chronicle1 Significant events that mark the tragedy and exploitation of the “Indians” with whom he interacted. Despite the fear caused by religious imposition and its punishment in the afterlife, these painful events remain in people’s memory and are passed down from generation to generation.
He said he had learned some of the languages around Guatemala, given the wealth of the town and the “goodwill” of the Indians to meet his priest’s needs. He was determined to accumulate funds that would enable him to return to England, as he did not like it here, and he could not see a place where he could raise enough money for his return to guarantee his economic future.
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He pointed out that the religious had too much freedom and that they did not give to their superiors exactly what they collected from the Indians. In addition, they deducted living expenses, which he pointed out broke their vow of poverty. Every month he received a sum of money paid to him by the indigenous mayors and councillors, which they earned by growing wheat or corn. He also received money from the brotherhood every week for Mass and other ceremonies. In addition, he enjoyed silver offerings, chickens, candles, turkeys, cocoa and money produced by each saint with the money of the indigenous peoples, and there were thirty-eight images in Mixco and Pinula.
He also made a lot of money, he said, on celebrations of patron saint festivals, Christmas, anniversaries, funerals, baptisms, and other occasions that were more favorable to him during the five years he lived in these parts. For example, in one case, it is said that God sent “one of the seven plagues of Egypt,” a plague of locusts that destroyed the crops of the indigenous people, and although everyone was suffering, “The priests did a good job, for processions were held everywhere and masses were ordered to be said to ward off the plague.». When she retired, it was considered a miracle that masses were still held, which earned her more money than she usually received from the fraternity.
The following year, the Tabadillo plague occurred, killing more indigenous people than the Spanish. Then there were heavy rains, and many crops were lost. He mentioned that there was an unusual earthquake the following summer, which caused more deaths. All this was good for the priests, because they made good financial profits by bringing souls out of purgatory through the masses. He related that the decrease in the number of dead taxpayers affected their income, so they increased the registration and forced the indigenous people over the age of 12 to get married, because once they were married, they became taxpayers for the church.
This knot of twisted beliefs, manipulation and exploitation that it narrates is recorded in people’s memory. For some, this domination is normal, acceptable and justified; for others, it sustains and perpetuates the legitimacy of the struggle for emancipatory decolonization and cultural, social and political resistance to colonial strategies, even in the context of other forms of practice!
1 Thomas Gage’s Travels to New Spain. Part III, Guatemala. Artemis-Edette Publishing. 2000
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