Questionable choice for next American saint

When Francis travels to the US in September he will canonise a Spanish Franciscan friar, Fr Junipero Serra (1713-1784), who founded the first missions in California that converted native Americans to Catholicism.

Last Saturday Pope Francis described Serra as “one of the founding fathers of the United States, and a special patron of the Hispanic people of the country”.

Meanwhile Fr Vincenzo Criscuolo, a Franciscan from the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints, said Serra was “a man of his times”.

Neither of these statements necessarily contradicts suggestions that, as the San Francisco Chronicle put it, “the missions were little more than concentration camps where California's Indians were beaten, whipped, maimed, burned, tortured and virtually exterminated by the friars”. But the paper's claims might prove difficult to reconcile with Francis’ comments about Serra’s “holiness” and “saintly example”.

When Spanish King Carlos III requested in 1780 that the California missions free the Indians, give them legal representation, and stop whipping them, Fr Serra’s responded "spiritual fathers should punish their sons, the Indians by blows... I don't see what law or reasoning my Indians should be exempt from being whipped…We can not free the Indians, relinquish directing their future, or give up the authority to use punishment."

In a letter to Spanish commander Fernando Rivera y Moncada, asking that a group of four Indians who attempted to escape Carmel Mission several times in 1775 be punished, Fr Serra requested, “… two or three whippings which Your Lordship may order applied to them… If your lordship does not have shackles, with your permission they may be sent from here. I think the punishment should last one month.”

So why canonise Blessed Serra and why do so now?

Fr Harvey Egan, a Jesuit and professor emeritus of theology at Boston College said in 2013 "Sainthood is often as much about politics and image as anything else." He was speaking after Pope Francis unblocked the long-stalled beatification process of Archbishop Oscar Romero.

It is suggested that within 10 years half of American Catholics will be Hispanic/Latino. I think Francis and the Church think the canonisation will be a boost for Latinos – even though Serra was Spanish, not Latino – and a boost for Latino Catholicism at a time when increasing numbers are being attracted to Evangelical Churches.

Pope Francis has ruled out a stop at the US/Mexico border on his forthcoming trip to US, saying it would take too long. He has spoken about plight of refugees and that border is key for illegal immigrants trying to reach the US. A visit there could offend his American hosts, given the US’s strained relations with Mexico on immigration, so the first canonisation on American soil of a Hispanic, and by a Spanish-speaking pope, will have to suffice.

But presumably Serra is being canonised as an example for today’s and tomorrow’s Catholics. His canonisation, and rather more significantly his beatification by St John Paul II, suggests that baptism into the Catholic Church is sufficient justification for those actions of Fr Serra which today look especially questionable, the end justifying the means. Is that the example of sainthood we wish to present to today’s and tomorrow’s Catholics?

Liverpool-born John Quinn is a retired lay Catholic teacher living in Canada. He blogs at www.facebook.com/ScouserQuinn

Photo: Anatoly Terentiev via Wikipedia