Religious Autonomy and Local Religion among Indigenous Confraternities in Colonial Mexico, Sixteenth-Seventeenth Centuries

Abstract

Confraternities were indispensable charitable institutions in colonial Mexico. Not only did missionaries see the potential of confraternities as a vehicle for evangelization, but also indigenous people themselves used Christianity as a tool for their own protection and survival. Whether it be in their hospital work or economic transactions, indigenous people ultimately became advocates of their own Christianity to advance their social status and power, and to negotiate their community positions. Indigenous customs were by no means eradicated within the new colonial society, and evidence of hybrid practices and local religion can be seen in the activities of confraternity members. By drawing on indigenous symbols and styles and fusing Christian saints with ancestral deities, indigenous people formed a Christianity of their own that was neither fully “orthodox” nor wholly “unorthodox.” Between these two extremes, confraternity life fluctuated dynamically. What emerges from confraternity records, often written in Nahuatl with finances recorded in Aztec currencies, can aptly be called “Nahua Christianity,” a combination of pre- and post-conquest religiosity.