Viewpoint Sorrows are plentiful, answers scarce in
Acteal
By GARY MacEOIN
My own reaction I must confess to you. It was one of rage.
That was -- as Bishop Samuel Ruiz García said -- the saddest Christmas
of our lives. I would not want any of you ever to participate in such a
Mass.
I know what I was thinking. As the 45 coffins, blood oozing
from them, were unloaded from the horse boxes, I could think only of the moment
in the Book of Kings [1 K 21:19] when Elijah told King Ahab: And Yahweh
says this -- in the place where the dogs licked the blood of Nabob, the dogs
will lick your blood, too.
The speaker was Oscar Salinas, a priest of the diocese of San
Cristóbal de Las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico, who works in Acteal, where 45
unarmed men, women and children were massacred last year just three days before
Christmas. Invited by Pax Christi-Texas, Salinas was speaking at Our Lady of
the Lake University in San Antonio.
Fr. Salinas paused. That was what I was thinking. But as I
listened, I could scarcely believe what the survivors who thronged the church
were praying. Forgive those who killed our brothers and sisters,
was their prayer. Forgive them.
The major facts about the massacre by paramilitary terrorists in
the church of Acteal are already on record. But, as often happens, the details
are critical, details I was only now learning.
I had known that those killed belonged to an organization called
the Abejas, and that abeja is Spanish for bee. But who were they?
Salinas explained that they came together originally in 1992 in the community
of Tzanembolón in the county of Chenalhó to help resolve a family
dispute over land. They chose the name because we are many and we
want to build our house like a honeycomb where we all work collectively and all
enjoy the honey, that is, the fruit of our common labor. They never read
Marx or Gandhi, but from deep study of the scriptures came a total commitment
to nonviolence, a refusal to bear arms, even in self-defense.
The Abejas movement, ecumenical while predominantly Catholic, has
spread to 25 communities. The movement now has 4,000 members who promote
health, human rights, alternative marketing, womens issues and musical
groups. Committed to nonviolence, they refused to join the Zapatistas in 1994,
but openly support the Zapatistas demands. We do not obey the
county and state governments, they say, because we did not elect
them, and they are not just.
As harassments and attacks of the paramilitary groups intensified
last fall, many Abejas fled their homes and communities. They live in camps for
displaced persons in San Cristóbal and other towns, including
Acteal.
On Dec. 22, 1997, word of heavy shooting in Acteal reached the
diocesan Human Rights Office in San Cristóbal. Msgr. Gonzalo Ituarte,
vicar general, called the state secretary of government in Tuxtla
Gutiérrez. He promised to investigate, called back shortly to report
that some shots had been fired in the air, but there was no cause for
alarm.
Late that evening, wounded persons began to reach San
Cristóbal, where 24 were hospitalized. Members of the Human Rights
Office collected their stories and went to Acteal early Dec. 23. They found
blood, bullet holes in the church walls, scraps of clothing and other signs of
violence but no bodies. The sub-secretary of government, assistant to the man
who had assured Msgr. Ituarte that there was no cause for alarm, had come with
a squad of police and trucked the bodies to Tuxtla.
Mayan traditional rituals for the dead are important. Thanks to
Bishop Ruizs intervention, the state authorities finally promised to
deliver the bodies -- now 48 hours dead -- in refrigerated cars to Acteal by 2
p.m. Dec. 24.
At 8 p.m. the bodies, transported in horse trailers with a few
pieces of ice in each coffin, arrived at Polo, a village four kilometers from
Acteal. There Fr. Salinas and other priests celebrated the Eucharist and shared
the peoples long night of mourning, of tears, of wailing. It was indeed
the saddest Christmas ever.
At dawn they set out for Acteal, now joined by Bishop Ruiz who had
presided at Midnight Mass in the cathedral. I am sure I was not the only one to
recall Elijahs curse on Ahab as Salinas described the final scenes at
Acteal. The sun was now high in the sky, the odor of death from the 45 coffins
terrifying, swarms of flies blackened the sky. But two tasks still
remained: the legal and the traditional.
Tags on most body bags simply described the contents as a woman, a
female child, an infant. Each had to be opened, the person identified, a death
certificate prepared. Then the parents, siblings or children of each had to
grieve over the bloody remains, to touch, to weep, to place some special
personal belongings of the dead person in the coffin.
Ahab repented of his wickedness: He tore his garments and
put sackcloth next to his skin and fasted. And Yahweh forgave him.
Five months after the Acteal massacre, we have no sign of
sackcloth or fasting. Ninety indigenous peasants are in jail as suspects, a
typical public relations gesture to divert the accusing eyes of world opinion.
But what was the role of the secretary of government of the state of Chiapas
who told Msgr. Ituarte not to worry? Who planned and ordered the murders?
Nobody has been tried. We have no answers.
Gary MacEoins recent books include The Peoples
Church: Bishop Samuel Ruiz of Mexico and Why He Matters (Crossroad).
National Catholic Reporter, July 17,
1998
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