Identificador: TDX:1455
Autors: Galvez Abadia, Aida Cecilia
Resum:
Between 1918 and 1941, members of the Catholic Order of the Discalced Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mt. Carmel, commonly known as the Barefoot Carmelites, undertook the evangelization of indigenous and black populations in the Urabá region, delegated by the Colombian government as part of an effort to connect the periphery with the nation-state. Broadly, this research refers to the 'second missionary wave', that is, the transition period between the XIX and the XX Centuries, when Catholicism and Protestantism were forcefully expanding from Europe to many other countries, including those in Latin America. Employing a phenomenological perspective, this analysis examines chronicles relating to the hardships of the missionaries, and the functions and meanings of these narratives via books and periodicals, in-depth interviews and documentary sources of the Carmelite Order, and in particular correspondence. The arrival and integration of these foreign friars was a process involving conflicts of jurisdiction with the local clergy, aggravated by what the visitors perceived as their underprivileged relation with the natural habitat, a notion that never abandoned them throughout their stay in the region. Following Goffman's proposal, this aspect, fully documented in existing mission sources, allows us to reconstruct two streams of suffering: the experiences undergone by Prefect José Joaquín Arteaga and his subordinate, Friar Amando de la Virgen del Carmen. The thesis studies the life of Prefect Arteaga between 1919 and 1926, the year in which he died of malaria at 48, after laying down the mission's groundwork. Friar Amando arrived in Colombia in 1914 and from then on felt the tension between a contemplative religious vocation and his ministry in the outside world. He died of tuberculosis in 1947, at 68. The missionary project of the Barefoot Carmelites, like many at the time, reinforced its legitimacy through the socialisation of the suffering endured as missionaries. Thus a language was consolidated, shared by public authorities, inhabitants and members of the religious orders alike, that implied the moral judgement of the Urabá region, a place viewed even from before as a dense and dangerous jungle, surrounded by a raging sea and steeped in savagery, and thus in sore need of the mission's redeeming offices. Beyond the impact of the hardships experienced, and the way these sufferings were reflected in how social reality was tackled, this research ratifies, in accordance with the providential vision of the history of Catholicism, that the identity of missionaries as beings who assume pain as a way of life, and their vocation in the service of souls, far from being gratuitous demands the mediation of personal sacrifice. Although both friars in question ultimately adjusted to the canon of 'heroic and religious obedience' - one of the sanctioned ways in which to comply with the doctrine of obedience - their stay in Urabá was plagued with ambivalences and constant doubts. The breach between the imperatives of the religious order and self-preservation gives way to personal histories revealing the different shades of suffering that those opting for the missionary life endure.
Repositori URV