The spreading of Christian views and beliefs were very popular amongst the French and Spanish societies. Both the French and Spanish missionaries took it upon themselves to travel to the “New World” to spread the message of Christ. Many of the missionaries were not prepared to deal with the very different lifestyles and religious views that the natives had. The missionaries had to use many tactics to relay the message of Christ to the native people of the Americas. Many missionaries would struggle at converting the natives while on their religious quest to mission. Both the French and the Spanish would feel as though it is their duty to try and convert these pagan believers to Catholicism. This would ultimately lead to conflict amongst the different cultures. This paper will discuss the many different tactics used by both the French and Spanish missionaries in trying to convert and spread Catholicism. It will also discuss how they also viewed the lifestyle and culture of the natives. Lastly I will discuss how the natives responded to the missionaries and what they thought of these foreign invaders. Many tactics of the Spanish were in an attempt to convert the Indians to Catholicism. There were peaceful and violent actions taken in regards to trying to convert the Indians. Many missionaries were sent with charters to the new land to try and bring the natives the Christian faith. Many missionaries didn’t know the language or rituals of the natives, so that made it hard for the monks to preach the divine word of God. They would find interpreters to not only speak to the Indians but also to help the monks understand the Indians beliefs and culture better. Another tactic that was used was that the missionaries would try to appear to ... ... middle of paper ... ...of the natives responded to forceful and violate tactics but only because they feared for their lives. Overall the natives felt that these foreigners were being invasive and didn’t like that they had to convert and get rid of their gods and traditions. The Spanish and French push for conversion among the Native Americas was a major mark in early American history. The missionaries came to convert the pagan Indians and bring to them the laws of Jesus Christ. Some of the missionaries had success and others had the very opposite, which lead to war. Some natives were eventually accepting of the French and Spanish and some were not. Just like some views that the Spanish and French had about the Indians differed depending on the circumstances. Overall this paper discussed a few of those differing views and how the missionaries’ tactics were used to convert the Indians.
The English took their land and disrupted their traditional systems of trade and agriculture. As a result, the power of native religious leaders was corrupted. The Indians we...
Giles, Thomas S. "How did Native Americans Respond to Christianity?" Christian History, 1992, Volume 11, Issue 3, p20.
When Columbus arrived on the Caribbean island of San Salvador in 1492, one of the first things he and his crew did was kneel in thanks (Moore, 2006). Early Spanish explorations of the present day United States were not complete without a missionary element. Even the British colonists tried to convert the eastern Natives to Christianity. Almost from the New World’s discovery, religion procured a dominant role in its early history. As one of the three main factors that drove settlement of America, religion and religious freedom grew to hold an important place in colonial culture and the heart of nearly every American. All too often, however, in a study of colonial history, religion’s role is misconstrued (Bonomi, 2003). In Under the Cope of Heaven, author Patricia Bonomi clarifies the importance of colonial religion through several different arguments, including religion’s entertainment value, the role in the Great Awakening, and ultimately the Great Awakening’s part in the American Revolution.
In George E. Tinker’s book, American Indian Liberation: A Theology of Sovereignty, the atrocities endured by many of the first peoples, Native American tribes, come into full view. Tinker argues that the colonization of these groups had and continues to have lasting effects on their culture and thus their theology. There is a delicate balance to their culture and their spiritual selves within their tightly knit communities prior to contact from the first European explorers. In fact, their culture and spiritual aspects are so intertwined that it is conceptually impossible to separate the two, as so many Euro-American analysts attempted. Tinker points to the differences between the European and the Native American cultures and mind sets as ultimately
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The Society of Jesus is a Catholic order that is still doing good work today around the world. During the age of encounters—especially during the colonization of the Americas—the Society of Jesus, also known as Jesuits, played an important role in documenting Native Americans, converting them and helping them adapt to their newly changing environment. The practice of first establishing respect, then influence, and eventually working for religious conversion proved effective at converting Native Americans in North America. Their extensive ethnographic documentation as well as everyday letters to one another have proved useful to scholars trying to understand early Native American and French encounters in North America.
Throughout human history, religion has played a fundamental role in societal development, regardless of the culture. Christianity, in particular, has profoundly shaped the last two thousand years of history and continues to do so today. This holds true in the case of European development and exploration of the New World. As exploration in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries flourished, many countries set out to declare land on behalf of their country, and in an effort to bring honor to their God. When English settlers first developed colonies in New England, one of their goals was to share the word of God with the Native Americans they encountered. This drastically conflicted with the views of the Native Indians, and completely altered the development of North America. European religious views in early North American exploration set the tone for America’s development into a commodification driven society that exploited the environment as a means of economic potential.
The Europeans used their power of law and order to subdue and control the indigenous. They wanted to instill their beliefs, culture, and values onto the natives and used agents of directed culture change to influence the people. Missionaries played a major role in transforming the native communities. Missionaries believed they were helping the inhabitants by “converting and civilizing” the indigenous. They also used their power to exploit any resources they could find to benefit the church and their home land. However, while they worked with authority to take over land and culture, they often had conflict with the brutal treatment that authorities inflicted on the native people. Missionaries had many views on converting. Some thought “that indigenous people were subhuman and should be controlled… others assumed that indigenous people were … capable of intelligent thought and reasoning” (Bonvillain 2013). Missionaries claimed they were enlightening the people and used economic and political arguments to convert them. If the natives were to convert they awarded them with favorable trading and provided guns for their use. Missionaries also encouraged Christia...
The Spanish and the Native Americans were from opposite sides of the globe, they were different culturally, spiritually and linguistically, therefore communicating must have been difficult. In the unlikely chance that the Natives accepted Christianity, they never accepted it wholeheartedly but merged it with their own religions. For example, the image of the procuress (devil) in Sahagun’s Florentine Codex, although the natives were depicting some sort of devil in their painting, it was not the European idea of a devil. This proves that when the natives accepted the Christian ideas, they were adapting them to their own beliefs. The friars would not have tolerated their imperfect form of
In earlier years of conquest the colonial church was still intact by the time the country was now New Spain. The church organization had by then created two distinct branches- secular and regular clergy. This would then spread around the word of Christianity to save souls. By assimilating this spread to the population of “Indians” they would then get acculturated into thinking their way of living was evil and to abandon their beliefs and to always “praise the lord”. Through t...
While the far-away North American tribes were having their land taken away, and being harassed by white American expansionists, they also faced another threat: Spanish occupation. During the early-1500’s, many Spanish explorers and conquistadors, such as Cabeza de Vaca, wished to find gold and riches and, in the process, they harassed, oppressed, tortured, and spread deadly diseases to the Native tribes. They often used the excuse of racial class-separation, known as “castas,” to justify their rotten, atrocious crimes. Throughout the 1600’s and 1700’s, the focus of the Spanish explorers experienced a shift from conquistadors wishing to acquire gold and wealth to Catholic missionaries wishing to religiously convert the Native tribes and, as a result, they built up many churches on the land. As one might guess, the
These approaches by European Americans were thought to be more socially acceptable means to acquiring more land and expansion of their new world. The missionaries were successful at baptizing hundreds of Native Americans. They used the bible, sermons and Christian beliefs in God to influence tribal members to give up their cultural beliefs. The bible was translated into their native language in order to provide instruction and commitment to the word of God. In this culture, the way to a better life and forgiveness for savage acts, would be offered to all who believe in one God and become Christians. Heaven was introduced to the American Indians as well as a new belief in Hell, as an alternative demise. In all, many Christians came about from the missionaries’ efforts. Catherine Tegahkouita was one of the most celebrated Mohawk convert. There would be no other as devoted to God as she was during this crusade. “Nothing could be more beautiful, but with that beauty which inspires the love of virtue. The people were never weary gazing on her, and each left with his heart full of the desire to become a saint”.5 As more and more time went on, villages grew in Christian numbers. Still the missionaries continued to venture on to new unexplored lands to bring God’s word to them. Their objective, to save them from their barbaric
The first Catholic priests came to South America with the conquistadors and through social and political force superimposed 16th century Catholicism upon conquered peoples and in subsequent generations upon slaves arriving in the New World. Catholicism has, likewise, frequently absorbed, rather than confronted, popular folk religious beliefs. The resulting religion is often overtly Catholic but covertly pagan. Behind the Catholic facade, the foundations and building structure reflect varying folk religious traditions. (2)
Tension and disputes are sometimes resolved by force but more often by negotiation or treaties. On the other hand, the Natives were described as strong and very innocent creatures awaiting the first opportunity to be christianized. The Indians were called the “Noble Savages” by the settlers because they were cooperative people, but sometimes, after having a few conflicts with them, they seem to behave like animals. We should apprehend that the encounter with the settlers really amazed the natives, they were only used to interacting with people from their own race and surroundings and all of this was like a new discovery for them as well as for the white immigrants. The relations between the English and the Virginian Indians were somewhat strong in a few ways.
In the book “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe we are given insight into what life was like before and during the European, imperialist land grab of africa. In this essay I will discuss how the christian missionaries tried to convert the native African population to christianity and what made some of the villagers join the christian missionaries in converting their fellow clansmen. We will also examine how Europeans used a combination of fear and cooperation to successfully convert the native population to christianity.