The historian García Cárcel dismantles the Vatican argument that Spain manipulated the bulls: “The Monarchy fulfilled its part”

The Vatican responded this Thursday to the requests of indigenous groups that have been demanding for months that the Pope withdraw several bulls from his predecessors from the times of the Discovery of America. Specifically, these are the bulls ‘Dum Diversas’ (1452) and ‘Romanus Pontifex’, from 1455, by Nicholas V, and the briefs ‘Inter Caetera’ and ‘Inter Caetera’, from 1493, by Alexander VI, which gave Spanish and Portuguese explorers to claim areas populated by ‘infidels’ or ‘wastelands’ (‘terra nullius’). The Pope learned how important the revocation of the bulls is for indigenous groups during his trip to Canada last July. On the flight back to Rome, a Canadian journalist explained to him that “in the US and Canadian Constitutions, indigenous peoples continue to be dispossessed of their land, without power over it, because of those papal bulls that make up the called ‘Doctrine of Discovery’ ». Standard Related News No Ten things in the history of Spain that you think are true and are not César Cervera Neither Boabdil was an enemy of the Catholic Monarchs nor did Darwin’s grandfather know and praise the Spanish Empire, many facts that are taken for granted are product of legends or a little-informed anecdotary After taking good note of the claim, the departments for Culture and Education and the Service for Integral Human Development resolved the issue with a ‘Joint Note on the Doctrine of Discovery’. The conclusions of this Vatican text say that, although “these papal bulls did not adequately reflect the equal dignity and rights of indigenous peoples, ‘the Doctrine of Discovery’ is not part of the teaching of the Catholic Church. Historical research clearly demonstrates that the papal documents in question, written in a specific historical period and related to political issues, have never been considered expressions of the Catholic faith.” “Spain complied with this process, although it is evident that there were a multitude of abuses starting with Columbus himself” The document points out that they were responsible for the damage caused to the colonial powers of that time “that competed with each other”, which comes to accuse countries such as Spain or Portugal for having “manipulated the content of the bulls for political purposes, to justify immoral acts against the indigenous populations, sometimes carried out without opposition from the ecclesiastical authorities.” “It would be a mistake to say that the Church is the only or even the main culprit in this case, since the main actors in the colonial project were the political and commercial entities of the time, but it is a very important step that the Church has taken. today to recognize their part in this history,” says David C. McCallum, the Jesuit and expert the Vatican has proposed to comment on the document. In this sense, Ricardo García Cárcel, professor of Modern History at the Autonomous University of Barcelona and an expert on the period, denies that the content of the bulls was not precisely what the Spaniards applied: «The Alexandrian bulls to which The Pope refers to, they simply marked the granting of the legal domain of the Spanish Monarchy over the lands of infidels and legitimized their kings to take possession of them for their evangelization. Spain complied with this process, although it is evident that a multitude of abuses occurred, beginning with Columbus himself, who was punished by the Crown due to his acts. The Crown was perfectly clear, and this is reflected in all Indian legislation, its evangelizing role. We can say that he complied with the object of the bull, with his part. Interview with Ricardo García Cárcel. José RamON LADRA The Vatican note takes the opportunity to vindicate other pontifical documents that protected the rights of indigenous people, such as the bull ‘Sublimis Deus’ (1537), of Pope Paul III, but does not mention that it was right within the Hispanic Monarchy where the first debates about it were born and those that moved Rome to carry out its own measures. «In 1511 the famous speech of the Spanish Dominican Montesinos against certain abuses of the conquerors already took place. And then, naturally, Bartolomé de las Casas will arrive and make a fuss with his ‘Brevísima Relacion’. The treatment of the Indian is an issue that will be legally addressed in the Valladolid controversy of 1550 between Ginés de Sepúlveda and De las Casas, who represent two visions within the Spanish Monarchy », he points out. MORE INFORMATION noticia No Ten things in the history of Spain that you think are true and are not news No This is how the Spanish Tercios crushed the aberrant (and extremely expensive) secret weapon designed to save Antwerp The Vatican document affects the historical responsibilities of many Christians in the marginalization of indigenous people, and renews the request for forgiveness for these gestures. “Many Christians have committed acts of evil against indigenous populations, for which recent Popes have apologized on numerous occasions,” he recites. Regarding this spiral of sterile pardons, García Cárcel suggests that «if we are going to make a historical memory with the whip whip, perhaps we should also go to the history of the Vatican and those absolutely unpresentable behaviors of the Popes of the time, with episodes of corruption and moral degeneration in Renaissance Rome. If you start to use history as a throwing weapon against others, in this case the Spaniards, you should start and finish before doing self-criticism of your story ».