VII. Irreconcilable Conflict Between Castaneda and Ramos Mexia

Such free education for the masses, coupled with free circulation of the Scriptures, alarmed the Roman hierarchy. This was particularly true in the case of Friar Francisco de Paula Castaneda (c. 1770-1832), crusading priest and church writer against democratic trends and governments as well as heretics and their heterodoxies. Castaneda was exiled to a remote spot in the Pampas, where he encountered the influence and teachings of Ramos Mexia, exponent of this new and strange Protestant religion, and who had become the beloved benefactor of that region.” ^{33Desenganador Gauchi-Politico, Aug. 20, 1822, p. 543.} First of all, Castaneda attacked the Protestant aspect of the Lancastrian system of reciprocal teaching, in which each child became the teacher of others. This had begun automatically to undermine the older dogmas of religious tradition. Multiplied thousands in America and Europe had learned to read under this new plan.PFF4 929.2

Catholics were alarmed that mutual teaching might become truly free, and hence dangerously democratic. The clergy fought it fiercely, fearful lest they lose their educational monopoly—for Lancaster, the founder, was a Quaker; and Thomson, the current propagandist, arrived with a shipment of Bibles as well, which he distributed like contraband. ^{34Arturo Capdevila, La santa furia del Padre Castaneda, p. 32. Published in 1833 during the short-lived Spanish Republic (1831-39) on one of a succession of nineteenth-century men who fought for or against liberty of thought and religion in Spain and Latin America.} The government was, meantime, pressing for ecclesiastical reform, and requiring reports from monasteries and convents concerning the lives and finances of the friars and nuns. Then came the decree that prohibited entry into the province, by any ecclesiastic who had not previously obtained permission of the government. ^{35Ibid., p. 189.} Don Manuel Jose” Garcia, Minister of Finance, was demanding reform in the houses of the ecclesiastics, and asserted that respectable clergymen desired it. And the situation called for reform. ^{36Ibid., p. 220.} Padre Castaneda felt the structure of the church reeling, as in an earthquake. So he saw “porticos warping, walls bulging outward, columns bending and sagging.” He “roared like a lion” against the democratic trends, and founded periodicals to fight them, as he sought permission to bring a halt to it all. ^{37Ibid., pp. 191-194.}PFF4 930.1

Things were now critical. A political, social, and religious tempest was sweeping over the Spanish colonies of South America. The vostex was swirling around Buenos Aires, in 1820, before Argentina, Chile, Peru, and other colonies succeeded in making their independence from Spain secure. Friar Castaneda exceeded the prerogatives of his order and violated the liberty of the press, defying the authorities. So he was banished for nine months to the deserts of Kaquel-Huincul, to quiet his rash anxiety in that uninhabited Argentine southern frontier, in sight of the savages. Taking but a few Catholic devotional books with him, he arrived in the winter. But here in a sparsely inhabited country, and with garrison unarmed, he learned about the daring colonizer, Ramos Mexia, heretic propagator of a new religion, who was faithfully catechizing the neophytes among the Gauchos and the Indians of the region. ^{38Ibid., pp. 196, 197.}PFF4 930.2

But Friar Castaneda met his equal in Francisco Ramos Mexia, man of influence in government circles. And Castaneda was where Ramos Mexia could keep an eye on his activities. But even during the friar’s short stay the forces of liberty gained considerable momentum, while he battled ardently for the church.PFF4 931.1

Prior to this episode, the reorganized Junta obliged Sarratea to resign, and named Ramos Mexia’s brother Idelfonso, acting governor. Then another council soon got into action, and in time ordered the acting governor to resign to the metropolitan council. So three governors came to succeed one another in quick succession. ^{39Adolfo Saldias, Vida y escritos del Padre Castaneda, p. 83. Saldias is author of nineteen volumes.} The political tempest involved everything and everybody. Everything seemed torn from its hinges. Men of affairs of every class clashed with one another. Sarratea, Soler, Alvear, Balcarce, Dorrego, Idelfonso, Ramos Mexia, the council, and Pagola succeeded one another in government between February and September of that fateful year “XX” (1820). And Castaneda fought his way into the midst of the fire and sought to smother it. ^{40Ibid., p. 120.}PFF4 931.2

This action provoked noisy protests from the multitude in the plaza, who gathered in front of the jail where the Franciscan was held. But on September 25 he was transferred to his place of exile in Kaquel, today called Maipu. ^{41Ibid., pp. 198, 199.} This was in the midst of an immense desert extending to the Andes and Magellan. It was a place of solitude. Only the camps of the Pampas and Ranquele Indians were there, who roamed as sovereigns and owners of the fertile flatlands where they were born. Few had attempted to civilize them ^{42Ibid., p. 199.}PFF4 931.3

1. RAMOS MEXIA SEEKS CONVERSION OF INDIANS

This brings us again to Ramos Mexi’a as owner of a large tract of land in this southern region. He had made friends with the chiefs of the Pampas, the Tehuelches to the South, and the Ranquele Indians, declaring that they were the true owners of the territory. And he rebought the land from the Pampas, so they would not be prejudiced against him. These were the Indians who continued to live on his farm at Los Tapialas. Then he undertook their conversion to the principles of a new (Bible-Protestant) religion he had developed from his reading and study. In this endeavor he was most ardent, carefully instructing and catechising the Indians. And he was regarded by them as a “beloved king and respected pontiff.” ^{43Ibid., pp. 200, 201.}PFF4 931.4

2. PROTESTS EXPLOITATION BY PRIESTS AND AUTHORITIES.—

There he elaborated the writings of the prophets and apostles into a system, setting forth definite principles governing right and wrong. This he made known to Governor Marcos Balcarcein a long document in which he pleaded for the Indians and protested against the abuse practiced by the Roman priests and against the orders of governors calling for the massacre of the primitive owners of the land, as if the Indians were not human beings. He urged their recognition and instruction instead of their exploitation. To this end he sent an accompanying Primer(A B C) of Religion, which was dated “Miraflores, Nov. 28, 1820.” ^{44Ibid., pp. 201, 202.}PFF4 932.1

3. CASTANEDA-RAMOS MEXIA CLASH INEVITABLE

This was the situation when Padre Castaneda arrived and sought to force the issue presented by Ramos Mexia’s teachings and to spread traditional Catholicism among the Indians. A clash between the two viewpoints was inevitable. Ramos Mexia was possessed by his reformatory mission; and Castaneda, who had opposed the government, thought he could easily thwart Ramos Mexia and the Indian tribes. So he set about his task, often facing personal danger. But Ramos Mexia appealed to Governor Rodriguez to remove the officious priest. So the friar’s sentence of banishment was commuted, thus permitting him to return to Buenos Aires in August, 1822. But there he found the fires of anticlerical ism burning even more fiercely than before. ^{45Ibid., pp. 203-222.}PFF4 932.2

So Ramos Mexia, the image-burning “heretic,” and Friar Castaneda were soon in mortal conflict. In fact, the fighting friar was caught between two fires-civil anticlericalism as well as the “heresies” observed and taught by Ramos Mexia. Both of these aroused the friar’s combativeness, and he fought tenaciously against these twin “heresies,” as he saw them. But history shows that the fundamental causes of the struggles were profound, with roots that were deep and tenacious. The civil ax bared the diseased heart of repressive ecclesiastical dogmatism, aided by Biblical knowledge and democratic education of the masses, whose first primers were portions of the gospels and other New Testament books. Such was the setting and the principal figures.PFF4 933.1

4. COMMANDANT CONVERTED TO RAMOS MEXIA’S TEACHINGS

Another Catholic work, written by Friar Pacifico Otero, throws further light on Ramos Mexia from the Catholic viewpoint. Otero declares Ramos Mexia to be a “powerful dogmatizing heresiarch,” who proclaimed himself “hero of the south.” He quotes a legal accusation brought against him by Castaneda. This charges Ramos Mexia with being a “heresiarch,” having “burned images,” and with creating “six schools of theology in the south country,” with the full knowledge and consent of the commandants and the present government-the commandant having been “so thoroughly converted that he instituted the new religion professed by Ramos Mexia at the post and in the estancia (ranches) of the nation.”PFF4 933.2

Further, the teachings of Ramos Mexia were observed in both localities without a soul to oppose him except the foreman of the government estancia, Manuel Gramajo, of Tucuman. Castaneda further claimed that for seven years the government had not taken any steps against this “false dogmatizer.” And because of this, many at Kaquel oft exclaimed, “Viva la ley de Ramos” (Long live the law of Ramos). ^{46Otero, El Padre Castaneda, p. 51, footnote (1).} It was this “Ley de Ramos,” or law, or teachings, of Ramos, acclaimed by the people, and revolutionizing the southern part of the province, that alarmed the clergy and provoked the fear of the government in Buenos Aires, finally leading to restraining actions.PFF4 933.3