absolutely nothing, and then it was over.
“Good night, Diego,” Paloma said, climbing the steps to the house.
“Good night, Paloma.”
The following year, they announced their engagement.
4.
June 1926
P LUTARCO E LÍAS C ALLES—ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC two years earlier, in 1924—was, like many of the radicals and intellectuals around Morelia, a staunch atheist who harbored little sympathy for the Catholic Church. On June 14, 1926, Diego read in the newspaper that Calles would actively enforce Article 130 of the 1917 Constitution, stripping the church of much of its power. Priests no longer could hold public office, were required to register, and were not allowed to wear religious garb in public. Individual states were allowed to regulate the number of priests in specific regions, leaving entire areas completely void of clergy. Schools were secularized, and priests and nuns were regularly arrested. As a result, many began to flee to the United States.
Shortly after Diego read the newspaper article, he noticed the unease around Morelia gradually begin. Those opposing the church began nailing leaflets on posts around the city calling for control of the church by the government. Young people stood on the street corners and sidewalks shouting, handing out
Libre Morelia
leaflets announcing meetings to inform the wider public of the dangers and corruption inherent within the Catholic Church. After all it was the Benedictine and Franciscan monks in robes who had blessed the Spanish conquistadores, they charged, the very ones who then turned around and enslaved or slaughtered the indigenous. They told of the accounts of the priests in Nueva España, of their condescending view of the “native beast”—his savagery, his animalisticurges, and the murderous and treacherous tendencies coursing through his blood. The church, they proclaimed, had, from the beginning, manipulated the government, destroyed lives, shattered the nation’s faith.
The priests preached that it was the end time, that it was foretold that an era would come when a godless government would rule over this land, condemning generations of souls to an eternity in hell. Their sermons stirred up feelings of resentment and suspicion in Diego, his grandparents, and their closest acquaintances. They prayed in secret, late at night, by candlelight. The saint statues and crucifixes and rosaries were hidden away, brought out only when they were in the company of those that could be trusted. The air in the city was charged with a sense of instability, with nervous energy. Diego could see it in the way people walked, their steps quick and frantic, in how they eyed one another with erratic and suspicious glances.
At the university, Diego knew students were banding together in between courses or after school and congregating outside the church’s gates to protest. They wore hats emblazoned with red stars, cursed, and caused commotions wherever they went. Hearing of all of this, Diego thought about the warring tribes before the Spaniards arrived, the Conquista, the French occupation, the fight for independence, the revolution, now this, and what was yet to come. An endless cycle of violence in Mexico. It was in their nature to wage war over false ideologies. They would die that way. What a waste.
Diego was excited about meeting Javier for a cup of coffee. But when he showed up to the café that afternoon with Esteban Rosales, Diego became quickly annoyed. Esteban’s father owned and ran a small printing press which some of the more radical newspapers and daily circulars used. Esteban’s parents were atheists whose anarchistic beliefs were in direct violation of those of the Catholic Church and the country. In their preparatoria, Esteban Rosales had had few friends and was known around the school for being something of a misfit, an odd boy. He had been a skinny and frail teenager with messy hair and long legs. Now, he was more filled out, his hair cutand
“Good night, Diego,” Paloma said, climbing the steps to the house.
“Good night, Paloma.”
The following year, they announced their engagement.
4.
June 1926
P LUTARCO E LÍAS C ALLES—ELECTED PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC two years earlier, in 1924—was, like many of the radicals and intellectuals around Morelia, a staunch atheist who harbored little sympathy for the Catholic Church. On June 14, 1926, Diego read in the newspaper that Calles would actively enforce Article 130 of the 1917 Constitution, stripping the church of much of its power. Priests no longer could hold public office, were required to register, and were not allowed to wear religious garb in public. Individual states were allowed to regulate the number of priests in specific regions, leaving entire areas completely void of clergy. Schools were secularized, and priests and nuns were regularly arrested. As a result, many began to flee to the United States.
Shortly after Diego read the newspaper article, he noticed the unease around Morelia gradually begin. Those opposing the church began nailing leaflets on posts around the city calling for control of the church by the government. Young people stood on the street corners and sidewalks shouting, handing out
Libre Morelia
leaflets announcing meetings to inform the wider public of the dangers and corruption inherent within the Catholic Church. After all it was the Benedictine and Franciscan monks in robes who had blessed the Spanish conquistadores, they charged, the very ones who then turned around and enslaved or slaughtered the indigenous. They told of the accounts of the priests in Nueva España, of their condescending view of the “native beast”—his savagery, his animalisticurges, and the murderous and treacherous tendencies coursing through his blood. The church, they proclaimed, had, from the beginning, manipulated the government, destroyed lives, shattered the nation’s faith.
The priests preached that it was the end time, that it was foretold that an era would come when a godless government would rule over this land, condemning generations of souls to an eternity in hell. Their sermons stirred up feelings of resentment and suspicion in Diego, his grandparents, and their closest acquaintances. They prayed in secret, late at night, by candlelight. The saint statues and crucifixes and rosaries were hidden away, brought out only when they were in the company of those that could be trusted. The air in the city was charged with a sense of instability, with nervous energy. Diego could see it in the way people walked, their steps quick and frantic, in how they eyed one another with erratic and suspicious glances.
At the university, Diego knew students were banding together in between courses or after school and congregating outside the church’s gates to protest. They wore hats emblazoned with red stars, cursed, and caused commotions wherever they went. Hearing of all of this, Diego thought about the warring tribes before the Spaniards arrived, the Conquista, the French occupation, the fight for independence, the revolution, now this, and what was yet to come. An endless cycle of violence in Mexico. It was in their nature to wage war over false ideologies. They would die that way. What a waste.
Diego was excited about meeting Javier for a cup of coffee. But when he showed up to the café that afternoon with Esteban Rosales, Diego became quickly annoyed. Esteban’s father owned and ran a small printing press which some of the more radical newspapers and daily circulars used. Esteban’s parents were atheists whose anarchistic beliefs were in direct violation of those of the Catholic Church and the country. In their preparatoria, Esteban Rosales had had few friends and was known around the school for being something of a misfit, an odd boy. He had been a skinny and frail teenager with messy hair and long legs. Now, he was more filled out, his hair cutand
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