For over 500 years the Christian message of salvation has been carried to the many native peoples of Mexico in the hands of the Church’s missionaries. In the most remote parts of this magnificent and mountainous country, the work of Catholic missions is carried out for the “salvation of souls” where the Gospel is still to be proclaimed.

Like St. Paul the Great Apostle, each missionary must say as he did to the Church of Corinth: “. . . when I came to you, I was weak and trembled all over with fear, and my teaching and message were not delivered with skillful words of human wisdom, but with convincing proof of the power of God’s Spirit. Your faith then does not rest on human wisdom but on God’s power.” (1 Corinthians 2: 3-5)

St. John Bosco’s Salesians in Mexico continue this courageous missionary tradition through their works for “the young and the poor” not only in their nation’s great cities, agricultural centers, and “la frontera” – the border with the USA. They humbly strive in their ministry to native tribes living outside the so-called mainstream of “la cultura mèxicana”. For one brief month I shared this experience in the northern hills of Oaxaca, Mexico.

Mexico’s State of Oaxaca
Where and what is Oaxaca (wah-HAH-kah)? According to Moon Handbooks – Oaxaca: “On the map of North America, Mexico’s state of Oaxaca makes up the southern bulge of Mexico, the region where the Mexican coastline thrusts into the Pacific like the belly of a frolicking Pacific dolphin.” (p.1) The description is poetic, however, in reality the geography can be challenging to any city bred American.

Oaxaca is the fifth largest of Mexico’s thirty-one states (about the size of Indiana, USA) with altitudes as high as 10,000 feet. The climate is mostly semi-tropical and the flora and fauna can be stunning. On the other hand, the average daily income per active worker is US $4.60 among a population of more than 3,000,000.

The mesmerizing uniqueness of Oaxaca is that 50% of the state’s peoples are “indigenous”, who date back their Oaxacan civilization (pre-Hispanic) more than 3,000 years. Today 16 separate languages ranging from Zapotec (402,000 native speakers) to Popoluco (1,000 native speakers) are spoken in the state, nevertheless, in most places the primary language of both faith and finance is Spanish.

Father José Antonio, pastor of San Antonio parish, which encompasses 25 villages.

The Mission of “San Antonio de las Palmas”
My missionary expedition to Oaxaca involved a 6 hour or so flight from the New York/New Jersey area to the international airport of Veracruz, Mexico (not Oaxaca) on the Gulf of Mexico coast. At the airport I was met by my Salesian confrere Fr. Josè Antonio Garcìa Rodriguez. From Veracruz we boarded a “coach” bus and took the highway up to the city of Tuxtepec in northern Oaxaca (a bustling commercial center on the Rìo Papaloapan). Then it was time for another bus (not a “coach”) and we ventured at times precariously up mountainside dirt roads to Ayotzintepec. At this developing crossroads town we boarded a truck to ascend the mountain on the last leg of the journey. After about 10 hours of traveling we arrived in the hilltop mission of “San Antonio de las Palmas,” where Fr. Josè Antonio is Pastor.

“San Antonio,” the village and the parish, is a complex of palm thatched cottage homes, a concrete church, clay roads, bodegas, streams, horse paths, a two room jail at the municipal building, the Don Bosco Center for Youth and Catechesis, cow pastures, etc. All this built in the shadow of a verdant green mountain – it is at times breathtaking!

More than a 1,000 inhabitants reside in San Antonio and 99.9% are members of the Chinanteco people. These native peoples number over 100,000 in the entire state of Oaxaca and their ancestral northern lands are known as the “Valle Nacional.” Even though they are only about 4% of the 1.2 million indigenous peoples of Oaxaca, they are steadfastly proud of their language (Chinantec), their Catholic faith, and their agrarian culture. Theirs is a hard life of tilling the mountain side soil and farming maize (corn). They are a hard working people: men, some women, and older children not in school work the terrain. They are basically subsistence farmers and cattle ranchers working the land of their ancestors as has been done for thousands of years. While most of the men labor in the fields, the women perform the exhausting duties of daily food preparations (grinding corn for “tortillas”), raising chickens and turkeys, laundering clothes in the river, rearing children, etc.

The village of San Antonio de las Palmas is only about 75 years old, but the Church has been present in the region for 500 years. Historically the faith was first brought to the Chinanteco peoples by the Order of St. Dominic – the Dominican Friars. In the 1960s and 1970s the Salesians were invited to take responsibility for twelve mission parishes in the state of Oaxaca with each church ministering to different tribal groups. Unlike urban Catholic parishes that encompass neighborhood blocks and streets, the parish of San Antonio, inclusively, encompasses 25 villages with population ranges from 75-1,500. And this is part of the immense challenge of evangelization, catechesis, and youth ministry! The nearest village chapel to San Antonio is “Arroyo Tinta” at only 30 minutes on foot. Over grassy mountain hills and through many a river stream the remaining 23 villages vary in travel time from 1-8 hours on foot to as much as 2-6 hours by truck and bus. Nevertheless, the Salesians and their lay collaborators courageously carry on the working of preaching and building “God’s kingdom” to the young and the poor.

A Highlight: Youth Groups
A highlight of the indigenous Salesian youth movement in this part of northern Oaxaca State are the youth groups of pre-teens and adolescents that have been developed in most of the 25 villages of the parish community. Each is a self-sustaining unit with both adult and peer leaders who emphasize Christian values in the Salesian style of joy and optimism. At the same each unity encourages constant moral growth and quality of life development.

These groups of young people, called A.L.D.E.A.S., are a force within their communities to face head-on the great societal challenges facing the Chinanteco peoples and all the ethnic minorities in Oaxaca:
• high levels of alcoholism,
• fractured families due to immigration to the USA (“el norte”),
• lack of meaningful and life-sustaining work,
• limited educational opportunities,
• racism and prejudice directed toward native peoples in general,
• perceived political lip-service from government officials,
• corrupt economic systems forcing them to continue in poverty,
• coercion by urban drug traffickers,
• and a lack of hope, that leads to despair.

“Juanito,” as I will call him, is one of the hundreds of young people in whom the Salesian mission truly takes on the face of Christ. Born both deaf and mute this young thirteen-year-old boy is in many ways the future of his immediate family. Like other native teenagers facing great odds he too could give up on hope. He could simply give in to distraction in alcohol abuse or illegal cultivation of marijuana for sale to the “narcotraficantes,” drug traffickers, in the city.

Some lay volunteers serve the community in all their needs.

With the help of the Salesians (his village neighbors) and members of the community, “Juanito” sustains hope, even though others would say there is none. Riding on his horse he goes out to the pastures with a smile on his face to become the family provider he desires to be. He is an inspiration to others because he will not permit any so-called handicap to restrain him from improving his own life and that of his poor family. With a heart full of hope he contributes to the faith of the community of San Antonio in his witness to life. He is in reality that “good Christian and good citizen” that Salesian ministry is about promoting and forming by all of its ministry endeavors.

The primary Salesian ministry of the parish at large is sacramental, catechetical, and youth ministry oriented in the style of Don Bosco. A typical week for the village parish of San Antonio is centered on Saturday and Sunday. On the weekend, Sunday Masses and Baptisms are celebrated in San Antonio and two of the nearer villages. In these two days the center of the “parish” – the village of San Antonio – is bustling with Church activity: religious education classes (“la doctrina”) for children and young adults, youth group meetings, sacramental preparations, visits to the sick, Confessions, home visits and counseling, festal devotions, etc.

Monday is what the Salesians call “community day.” It is a time set apart from the rest of the week’s labors to pray in community, reflect, share common life, rekindle their Salesian identity within the mission of the Church, and to plan for the upcoming weeks’ apostolic activities. While the village of San Antonio and its environs enjoy the weekly presence and ministry of Salesian priests and lay ministers, the other mountain and remote areas normally celebrate Mass only once a month.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday are mission journey days. Over these four days a Salesian priest and a lay minister can travel to between 3-5 villages within the parish region to celebrate monthly Mass and other Sacraments, catechize, hold adult and youth meetings, pray for the dead, and visit village families. In many ways it is the life of the old time “itinerant preacher.” Even though each village is blessed with its own lay catechist and “mayordomo” (the person responsible for the chapel building), only one of the 24 villages outside of San Antonio has the reserved Blessed Sacrament for the celebration of Holy Communion without a priest. When a priest visits monthly it truly is a graced moment for him and the villagers to build up the “Body of Christ” locally and across the entire regional parish.

Fr. Richard preaching in the community chapel.

Deep Christian Faith
In my short month at the mission I was only able to visit and minister at 12 villages and was moved profoundly not by simple faith, but deep Christian faith based on centuries of trust and hope in the words of Christ Jesus the Lord to all God’s children, the little ones, the humble, and the poor.

The reality of young boys living on the streets, alone, abandoned, and exploited, living a self destructive lifestyle that often includes crime, drug use, and sexual abuse, is something that should concern all people of good will. For Christians, it should be a call to action to seek out these young boys to take them from the streets and provide them with shelter and love. In Mexico City, the Salesians have been doing just this for many years.

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