Personal reflections on the spiritual conquest and consolidation of early spanish colonization of New Spain in Septentrion

Abstract

This article reflects on the spiritual and political conquest of northern New Spain through a personal reading of the chronicle of the Jesuit Father Andrés Pérez de Ribas. The intent is to perceive the nature of this “vital source“ of northern history. Far from presenting evangelization as a paternalistic action, the chronicler itself shows pride of accomplishment of what could be called today a real ethnocide. The author of this article believes that reading is eminently his, not intended to establish any criteria of truth nor claims to have exhausted the meaning of that chronic, but presents a certain kind of reading that hopefully help the renewal of the history of American evangelization.