He is credited with establishing the Franciscan Missions in the Sierra Gorda, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Later, Serra suffered chest pains and shortness of breath; Palóu suggests that Serra's self-inflicted bruises were the cause. "Pedro Fages and Miguel Costansó: Two Early Letters From San Diego in 1769". In 1769, the Spanish king ordered land and sea expeditions to depart from Mexico to California. Sailing over 200 miles up the Gulf of California, they landed at Loreto two weeks later. To get from Veracruz to Mexico City, Serra and his Franciscan companions took the Camino Real (English: royal path), a rough road stretching from sea level through tropical forests, dry plains, high plateaus and volcanic sierra mountains to an altitude of 7400 feet (2250 meters). They were concentration camps. They had survived by slaughtering and eating their mules along the return trek south. "[citation needed], In one of his sermons in Mexico City, while exhorting his listeners to repent their sins, Serra took out his chain, bared his shoulders and started whipping himself. "[66] The next morning, soldiers traded with the Indians, swapping handkerchiefs and larger pieces of cloth for fish amidst lively bargaining. Serra pitched in himself, carrying wooden beams and applying mortar between the stones forming the church walls. [35], Back in the Sierra Gorda, Serra faced a conflict between Spanish soldiers, settlers, and mission natives or "Indians". Serra then departed for Mexico on October 17, 1772 to plead his case to the viceroy Antonio María de Bucareli y Ursúa. Serra was an 18th century Spanish missionary who established 21 Catholic missions in California as part of efforts to Christianize and assimilate Native Americans into European culture. Men on shore from the San Antonio, which had arrived three weeks earlier, had to board the San Carlos to help its surviving crew ashore. If Your Lordship does not have shackles, with your permission they may be sent from here. "[123] Francis further noted: "Instead of seeming to impose new obligations, (Christians) should appear as people who wish to share their joy, who point to a horizon of beauty and who invite others to a delicious banquet. 12, 1770. "[57], Two servants—one named José María Vergerano, a 20-year-old from Magdalena, the other a soldier guard—accompanied Serra on his journey from Loreto, as he rode on a feeble mule. [citation needed], The Junípero Serra Collection (1713–1947) at the Santa Barbara Mission Archive-Library are their earliest archival materials. [96], Serra wielded this kind of influence because his missions served economic and political purposes as well as religious ends. Serra was beatified by Pope John Paul II on 25 September 1988 in the Vatican City. Arriving at a farm at day's end, he could hardly stand. "[80], On April 16, 1770, the San Antonio set sail from San Diego Bay, carrying Serra, doctor Pedro Prat, engineer Miguel Costansó and a crew of sailors under captain Juan Pérez. Serra placed both hands upon their heads as a token of paternal affection. The three men then walked along the rocky coast south to Carmel Bay. [52], Serra started assigning his fellow friars to the missions scattered up the length of the Baja peninsula, with its scarce water and food sources. "[27] Serra asked his colleague to read this letter to his parents, who had never attended school. As local Indians cremated their dead, the wailing of their women sounded from local villages. Liam Stack, "Vandals Desecrate Carmel Mission Where Junípero Serra Is Buried", Brittany Woolsey, "Catholics coalescing to save statue of Serra,". Quick Facts Name Junipero Serra Occupation Missionary, Saint Birth Date c. November 24, 1713 Death Date c. August 28, 1784 Place of Birth Majorca, Spain It continues to have ties to the Franciscans and the legacy of Serra. [114], While administering Mission San Carlos Borromeo in Monterey, California, Serra had ongoing conflicts with Pedro Fages, who was military governor of Alta California. When I don't go along with the idea that the missions were concentration camps and that the Spanish brutalized every Indian they encountered, I'm seen as an adversary. In these last days a certain Cayetana, a very clever Mexican woman of said mission, married to one Pérez, a mulatto, has confessed—she, being observed and accused of similar crimes, having been held under arrest by us for some days past—that in the mission there is a large congregation of [Christian non-Indians], although some Indians also join them, and that these persons, ... flying through the air at night, are in the habit of meeting in a cave on a hill near a ranch called El Saucillo, in the center of said missions, where they worship and make sacrifice to the demons who appear visibly there in the guise of young goats and various other things of that nature. Francisco Palóu, November 24, 1769 report to the guardian of the college of San Fernando. [citation needed], On August 28, 1784, at the age of 70, Junípero Serra died at Mission San Carlos Borromeo from tuberculosis. Serra arrived in the New World in 1749 but it was not until 1769 that he reached Alto California as part of an expedition by the Spanish Governor. "If it goes on at this rate," wrote Palóu, "in a short time Baja California will come to an end." The commander, Gaspar de Portolá, tried to dissuade him from joining the expedition, and wrote to Gálvez about Serra's condition. Both groups would have to wait a year before receiving supplies and news from Mexico.[89]. California Bishop Speak Out Against Desecration of St. Serra Statue. This also helped to limit Russian explorations and claim to North America’s Pacific coast. Serra himself established nine missions, with a total of twenty-one missions eventually being established along the El Camino Real, from San Diego to Sonoma, a distance of 700 miles. Weighing the risk of his soldiers dying of starvation, Portolá set a deadline of March 19, the feast of saint Joseph, patron of his expedition: If no ship arrived by that day—Portolá told Serra—he would march his men south the next morning. [119] Salvatore J. Cordileone, archbishop of San Francisco, acknowledges Native American concerns about Serra's whippings and coercive treatment, but argues that missionaries were also teaching school and farming.[111]. The burial location of Serra is southeast of the altar and is marked with an inscription in the floor of the sanctuary. To understand the impetus behind missionary efforts in the 18th century, one must take into account the era's views on the salvation of unbaptized infants. [115][116] Serra moved the mission to Carmel due to better lands for farming, due to his conflicts with Fages, and in part to protect the Indian neophytes from the influence of Spanish soldiers. [98], From his perspective, Serra's singular purpose was to save the souls of indigenous Americans. Pilgrimage to the Carmel Mission. He was the head of the Spanish mission in California for many years, and he founded the first eight missions. If it is necessary to specify one of the persons guilty of such crimes, I accuse by name a certain Melchora de los Reyes Acosta, a married mulattress, an inhabitant of the said mission. ... Make me the same remedy that you would apply to an animal." When they camped for the night, the Indians pressed close. [59], On Pentecost day, May 14, 1769, Serra founded his first mission, Misión San Fernando Rey de España de Velicatá, in a mud hut that had served as a makeshift church when friar Fermín Lasuén had traveled up on Easter to conduct the sacraments for the Fernando Rivera expedition, the overland party that had preceded the Portolá party. By the time the Franciscans had moved north and turned the missions over to Dominican friars in 1772, the Indian population had decreased to about 5,000. Economically, the missions produced all of the colony's cattle and grain, and by the 1780s were even producing surpluses sufficient to trade with Mexico for luxury goods. "[4] Junípero Serra is the second native saint of the Balearic Islands after Catherine of Palma. Half of those who made it to San Diego spent months unable to resume the expedition, due to illness. After a protracted legal struggle, the settlers moved out, and in 1755 the Pames and friars reclaimed their land. At the request of Viceroy Bucareli, he drew up a proposal document (Representación) with 32 articles. He then assigned friar Miguel de la Campa as chaplain to the Portolá expedition, which set out from Loreto on March 9, 1769. [citation needed], He began in San Diego on July 16, 1769, and established his headquarters near the Presidio of Monterey, but soon moved a few miles south to establish Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo in today's Carmel, California.[20]. [135][136], During the remaining three years of his life, he once more visited the missions from San Diego to San Francisco, traveling more than 600 miles in the process, to confirm all who had been baptized. The government set up commissions and looked into alternative sites for the colony. He became Father-President of the missions after Father Serra… [133], Two members of California's Ohlone Tribe played roles in the canonization Mass by placing a relic of Serra's near the altar and reading a scripture in Chochenyo, a native language. Serra's fellow friar and former student Francisco Palóu also became concerned, gently suggesting to Serra that he stay in Baja California and let the younger and stronger Palóu make the journey to San Diego in his place. [79], Bolstered by the food unloaded from the San Antonio, Portolá and his men shifted their sights back north to Monterey, specified by José de Gálvez as the northern stake of Spain's empire in California. They now had less than 80 miles (130 kilometers) to reach San Diego. The group, founded in 1935, currently numbers a membership of about 20,000 worldwide. In this arid region, whose alkaline land resisted cultivation, lived the "poorest of all" the Indians Serra had encountered in Mexico. He and Crespí would meet in Monterey. Nor shall I omit to do the same for you so that all of us will attain the goal for which we have been created. The question of Franciscan treatment of Indians first arose in 1783. Statues or other monuments to Father Serra are found on the grounds of several other mission churches, including those in San Diego and Santa Clara. He did incalculable damage to a whole culture". [citation needed], Emulating an earlier Franciscan missionary and saint, Francisco Solano, Serra made a habit of punishing himself physically, to purify his spirit. In his letters to his Franciscan companions, Serra often referred to himself as a "sinner" and a "most unworthy priest. He wrote, "That spiritual fathers should punish their sons, the Indians, with blows appears to be as old as the conquest of the Americas; so general in fact that the saints do not seem to be any exception to the rule. The more zealous Franciscan and Jesuit missionaries did likewise. The founding celebration took place "with all the neatness of holy poverty," in Serra's words. Several women passed Serra's spectacles around with delight from hand to hand, until one man dashed off with them. 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