By David Magallanes /Guest contributor
I sometimes wonder what pastors of small, struggling churches think when they compare their small, incipient Sunday flocks scattered throughout the meeting room with the packed, standing-room-only masses that attend, well, Mass at the vastly larger Catholic churches in their community, particularly if the community is Latino.
After all, the local “Cornerstone of the Ages” church has to <gasp> advertise to, invite and cajole people in order to get a crowd large enough to suck up some oxygen in the room.
Meanwhile, the “masses” of humanity are shuttling in and out of the Catholic sanctuaries, as services transition from one to the next, just as those seen at major manufacturing plants during shift changes.
Of course, the Catholic churches don’t have to advertise. They may do so, but that’s only to let tourists and new residents know where to go for Catholic services. The Catholic churches pack the pews because so many of us were born into the Church. Family pressures, expectations, sheer momentum or just plain habit often keep us in the Church, unless we dare take the road less traveled and explore other beliefs or philosophies. In the case of Latinos of Mexican descent, Hernán Cortés, in the sixteenth century, saw to it that Mexicans thenceforth would not have much choice but to be born into the Holy Mother Church. In the first centuries of the new Mexican nation, the Church had an iron grip on that aspect of people’s lives — their religion — that most profoundly affected their choices and conduct.
Not that this was automatic and effortless on the part of the conquerors. The natives already had a highly organized belief system that was regarded as heretical and sacrilegious by the Church fathers. After all, wouldn’t you resist efforts aimed at upending your deeply-held religious faith — the one you were born into? The native Mexicans staunchly resisted efforts to convert them to the new faith — at least, until The Big Event.
What I refer to here is actually the pivotal series of events that pretty much locked all of Mexico into the domain of the Church of Rome. The reported apparitions of the Virgin of Guadalupe, who was generally regarded by the Aztecs at that time as Tonantzin, the Mother Goddess, converted the Aztec nation to Catholicism practically overnight, in historical terms. Well, yes, there was a certain amount of, shall we say, “coercion” involved.
In any case, at least some 80% of Mexicans are Catholic, at least officially, and in many locations throughout Mexico, the Catholic faith of its adherents is best described as “fierce.” During my trips to Mexico visiting relatives, I’ve seen entire cities virtually shut down by Catholic processions. The Faith is taken very seriously in parts of Mexico. Our Catholic heritage is interwoven into our Spanish language at practically every turn of phrase, sigh, angry utterance, or expression of hope or despair. Catholicism is practically imprinted into our Mexican DNA. We can leave the Church, but the Church will never leave us. We can run, but we can’t hide. Mother Church will always beckon those of us born and raised and educated in the Church.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, señores, señoras y señoritas, is my dilemma. I was born a son of the Church, baptized, confirmed and, as a child and teenager, participated often in the mysterious rite of the Mass and Holy Communion. Later in life, I did indeed explore those roads less traveled, and despite my best efforts to steer my little daughter away from a Church with which I no longer agreed, she grew up to sign herself into Catholic catechism and confirmation classes and is now enrolling my grandson into catechism (i.e., “indoctrination”) classes.
“Where did I go wrong?” I lamented.
But the pull is always there. It never leaves me. The Church beckons. I can think of a thousand reasons why I would not want to go back, but the gravitational force of the Church will always, it seems, try to pull me back into its orbit.
Which brings me to a scary decision point at this stage of my life: How, exactly, do I wish to be buried or cremated? In the Church — to which I’d turned my back so many decades ago? Or outside the realm of the Church that now counts my daughter as one of its daughters? Do I want to participate in the Church? But how can I when my theological views diverge so aggressively from official Church teachings?
Am I Catholic? Do I want to be? What does being “Catholic” mean? How do I answer my grandson’s questions about God and angels and saints?
I have my work cut out for me.
— David Magallanes is the creator of his own enterprise, Real World Projects, a speaking, writing and Internet marketing business dedicated to the advancement of the American Dream. An emerging branch of Real World Projects is Edifiquemos, a Spanish language enterprise dedicated to teaching the Spanish-speaking how to create a profitable international (U.S./Mexico) enterprise with low investment and high earning potential. David may be available for speaking opportunities. To contact him and for more information, you are invited to visit and explore his web sites at www.realworldprojects.info and at www.edifiquemos.com David Magallanes may be reached at adelantos@msn.com.