‘As Catholics, we need to know this history.’
— Father Javier Olivera Ravasi
This year is the 100th anniversary of the start of Mexico’s Cristero Counterrevolution—a three-year resistance 1926-1929 by ordinary Catholics against a virulent, profane anti-Christ government persecution aimed at destroying the Catholic Church.
At least 25,000 Mexicans died during the Cristero Counterrevolution 100 years ago, but the story is even more heartbreaking than those numbers indicate, said Father Javier Olivera Ravasi, the author of the book “The Cristero Counterrevolution and the Battle for the Soul of Mexico” during a Religious Freedom Week presentation at St. Raymond Parish June 23.
The motto of the Counterrevolution was “Viva Christo Rey! Long live Christ the King!”
Father Ravasi speaking with some of the attendees after his presentation.
After the Cristero War was ended with an agreement between the Mexican bishops and the government, another 50,000 Cristero were methodically killed by the government over the next few decades, Father Ravasi said.
“As Catholics, we need to know this history of the Church,” Father Ravasi told a crowd gathered in the Menlo Park church. The Cristero War is not taught in Mexico’s schools and is rarely mentioned in American history classes, he noted.
Father Ravasi, an Argentinian, is a co-founder of the Order of St. Elijah, a society of apostolic life. He is currently in residence at Star of the Sea Parish and will become administrator of St. Monica/St. Thomas the Apostle parishes in San Francisco on July 1.
Father Ravasi recounted stories of the martyrs of the Cristero War and shared some of the history that led to the Cristero War and its aftermath.
For at least one American of Mexican descent, Father Ravasi’s talk elicited an emotional response.
“I found the evening incredibly insightful and meaningful. This period of history is especially personal to me because my great grandmother lived through the Cristero War and shared stories of her experiences growing up in the municipality of Unión de Tula, Jalisco,” said Saul Perez, who organized the event. “When the military came through, they would hide the girls,” he said to protect them. Perez is the social action/digital media coordinator of the Office of Human Life & Dignity which sponsored the event.
“She would tell me how, as a young girl living on her family’s ranch, they had to hide her and their religious items when Mexican military forces would pass through the area, as Catholic communities faced persecution and violence during that time,” Perez said.
“What makes this history even more meaningful is that the parish priest from Unión de Tula during that period was St. Rodrigo Aguilar Alemán, a martyr of the Cristero War,” Perez said.
Father Ravasi and Saul Perez in St. Raymond Church.
St. Rodrigo Aguilar Alemán, buried in Unión de Tula, is one of six Mexican martyrs canonized by Pope St. John Paul II on May 21, 2000. All were priests and members of the Knights of Columbus. St. Rodrigo was hanged Oct. 28, 1927, but not before being asked three times by the soldiers in an attempt to get him to deny his faith: “Who are you hailing?” they asked. Each time, he responded confidently, “Christ the King and Saint Mary of Guadalupe!”
The brutality and stories of martyrs and heroes of that time can be found in Father Ravasi’s book.
The six Mexican Martyrs (feast day, May 21), canonized by Pope St. John Paul II on May 21, 2000. A total of 25 martyrs of the Cristero War were canonized at the same time by Pope St. John Paul.
The history of conflict between the forces of secularization and the Catholic Church dated back through the 19th century and earlier, Father Ravasi recounted. The Cristero Counterrevolution was sparked after the Mexican bishops suspended all sacraments Aug. 1, 1926 in response to the President Elias Calles’ brutal suppression of Catholicism that shut down convents and monasteries, enforced government oversight and control of priests, prohibited religious expression except within churches under direct government supervision, barred foreign priests, expropriated Church property and prohibited Church ownership of property and more.
The official denial of sacraments lasted for three years and was finally lifted because of Church leaders’ fear that the people were without the sacraments and were becoming used to living without them. Pope Pius XI later regretted the agreement because it gained nothing for the people and kept the restrictions in place with just a promise they would not be enforced, Father Ravasi told the group.
“It was the Catholic population that rose up and fought for the Church without depending on its hierarchy,” Father Ravasi writes in his history, and that laity in obedience laid down arms, he said. “Peace was needed.”
The secular Constitution of 1917 remains in force in Mexico. Many of Mexico’s anti-clerical laws were only repealed in the 1990s after Pope St. John Paul II’s visit in 1979, said Edward Clancy, outreach director for Aid to the Church in Need. The pope demanded that priests be allowed to wear their collars in public and celebrate a public Mass in the soccer stadium—both actions that were still illegal at that time. Vatican-Mexico diplomatic relations were restored in 1992 after more than a century of estrangement.
In California, two orders of contemplative nuns came to San Francisco to escape the brutal regime. Today, we are blessed to have the Carmelites of Cristo Rey, located on Parker Avenue near St. Ignatius Church and the Monastery of Perpetual Adoration on Ashbury Street.
—Valerie Schmalz is director of the Office of Human Life & Dignity.
