Winds of Santa Ana by Rick Kennedy

Author:Rick Kennedy [Kennedy, Rick]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781666794038
Publisher: Wipf and Stock
Published: 2022-04-26T18:59:20+00:00

I glance to leeward and Philosophia has appeared. We are still sailing southeastward through rough waters toward the mouth of the Santa Margarita River. Philosophia is opposite to me, wedged into the cockpit corner, blocked from most of the wind by the aft end of the cabin. She is wearing foul-weather gear. The collar is turned up high on the coat so as to keep spray off her neck.

“You lament the history of the California missions?” she asks me, apparently having read my mind.

“Yes and no. I am happy that maritime California was first united as a missionfield by a man now recognized as a saint. I lament the bad that happens when we Christians try to do what Jesus asks us to do.”

We are silent for a bit, looking at each other. The hull then reverberates with a pounding sound as the bow shoulders its way into an extra-steep on-coming swell. Water splashes back over both of us.

“Given the loss of Paradise depicted in the Snake Path, we Christian historians are surprised when anything goes right.”

“It is good to lament,” she eventually replies. “When in the Old Testament Joshua leads the Hebrew tribes violently into the Promised Land, I do not think readers are supposed to feel good. The triumph of Jesus on the cross does not call forth a cheer. World evangelism is often not a heartwarming story.”

Philosophia, after looking up into the darkening sky, continues: “St. Paul said we creatures see though a glass darkly. Jesus told his disciples, their evangelism will have disturbing consequences. ‘I did not come to bring peace,’ Jesus said.”

“Junípero Serra came here out of love.” I say. “He was doing what Jesus asked him to do. But many Indians suffered. Many of the Indians who embraced him and converted to Christianity also contracted syphilis.”

Philosophia and I talk about this for a while. In the 1770s, syphilis spread rapidly wherever the Spanish went on the Bight. Although most often thought of as sexually transmitted, syphilis seems to have spread mostly through contact directly with open sores or even clothing and blankets. Any sort of health care involving close contact spread the disease. Midwives spread the disease. Tattooing, which was much practiced by the Indians, spread the disease. Syphilis, which is not usually deadly, wheedled its way throughout the culture and debilitated society, especially at the missions. James Sandos in Converting California: Indians and Franciscans in the Missions offers a powerful chapter on the ravages of syphilis.70 By the time Serra died in 1784, the Franciscans knew Spain’s colonization was the cause of an uncontrollable epidemic. Sandos notes that Indian girls and women suffered disproportionately more than men from the new diseases. The missionaries felt a special duty to protect the health and well-being of girls and young women and set up women’s dormitories for them, but in trying to help them, the missionaries hurt them all the more. Marriages at the missions were encouraged but pregnancies declined. Of the pregnancies that did occur at the missions, many failed to reach full term.

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