Stay away from the foreign mission field if you’re not ready to face the unexpected. My recent trip to Peru — arranged to explore mission work being done by fellow Presbyterians there — packed the regular surprises: children whose effervescence belies their poverty, spotless homes set in the midst of barrios, mission programs being led by visionary and strategic-thinking Peruvian leaders. Those and many other joyous discoveries humbled this American Presbyterian, exposing his shallow sophistication and hollow materialism.
One surprise really was unexpected. And then it was dittoed.
On the first day in Lima, a three-hour city tour walked us into the Museo de la Inquisición — the Inquisition Museum. Nestled next to the Peruvian Congress building, this is one of Lima’s most popular and frequently visited museums. The building showcases the beautifully appointed courtroom where tribunals assessed the heresy accusations of the prosecutors. It walks the visitor through the underground, unlighted dungeon where the accused and condemned were held. It portrays in gory detail the forms of torture utilized there, including the pouring of water into the mouth of a mannequin strapped to a gurney, a primitive precursor to today’s waterboarding. The guidebooks report that the public burning of heretics, especially Spanish Jews, was ordered from here.
The museum is bold to acknowledge that this all took place from 1570 to 1820, fully 250 years of Peruvian history. While they point to the fact that the practice was imported from Spain, they don’t feign innocence.
Which leads to the second surprise, the ditto.
En route to a one-day excursion to Machu Picchu, one of the wonders of the world, we flew to the Andes mountain village of Cuzco. A picturesque city square welcomed us. Two grand churches on the square reminded us Protestants that the Catholics — with their differing religious orders — also have built competing congregations across the street from one another. The larger one, the magnificent Catedral with its five naves, could seat most of the town.
The Catedral extends a strange welcome to its many visitors. The tourists’ entrance on the left side of the edifice walks them by an outbuilding on which is found the prominent sign, Local de la Inquisición. According to one tour guide, hundreds of locals were tried, tortured, and even executed there.
What’s most stunning about this second surprise is its location. It is found neither alongside a governmental building, nor on the campus of a secular university, nor adjacent to a synagogue, but right there at a Roman Catholic Church. It confesses to every visitor that church’s greatest guilt, its darkest hours, when it violated common decency in its pursuit of religious purification.
The Inquisition is neither the first nor the last time that religious people, in the name of Jesus, have treated “infidels” in horrific ways.
Some of the most moving experiences of my ministry have come when participating in Kristallnacht memorial services at a local synagogue. Rabbi Grob of Temple Beth Shalom, Satellite Beach, Fla., graciously invited Christian colleagues to help lead that service. Pulsating around the personal testimonies of Holocaust survivors and around the litanies of prayer and Scripture, the liturgy beat the refrain, “Never again.”
My heart pounded in that rhythm, as I identified both with victim and victimizer.
Nevertheless, the Kristallnacht “never again” refrain urged us to prevent such a thing from ever again being done to us. In Cuzco’s Catedral, the “never again” urges us never again to allow such a thing to be done by us.
What kinds of memorials have we built to remind us never to repeat our past mistakes, our past sins?
As a Catholic-turned-Presbyterian, I often join the chorus of fellow Catholics in kidding about the irrepressible guilt that seems to pervade our church experience. As a Presbyterian, I thrill for the proclamation of grace and, especially, the assurance of pardon that sits at the center of our faith practices. However, that forgiveness too easily turns into a loss of memory. That loss then too easily turns into re-committing the sins of old.
Perhaps as American Presbyterians we could build some memorials, at least post some signs to remind us of our past sins — against Africans and Irish, against Japanese and Jews, against women and children — not to rehash old guilt but to remind us never again to do such a thing.
The foreign mission field caught me off-guard by reminding me of my past sins. It prompted me to resolve to never repeat them or sit idly by while others repeat them. For me, that alone made it worth the trip.
-JHH
