teresa urrea: mexican mystic, healer, and apocalyptic revolutionary

American Academy of Religion

Teresa Urrea: Mexican Mystic, Healer, and Apocalyptic RevolutionaryAuthor(s): Alex NavaSource: Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol. 73, No. 2 (Jun., 2005), pp. 497-519Published by: Oxford University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4139807 .

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Teresa Urrea: Mexican Mystic, Healer, and Apocalyptic Revolutionary Alex Nava

This article is a study of the mystical and apocalyptic dimensions of Teresa Urrea. As explained in this article, Urrea's mystical experiences and visions are unique for their connection with a prophetic-apocalyptic and political worldview. This apocalyptic dimension is more than a communication of a hidden message or spiritual world; it also includes a reading of history that is catastrophic and discontinuous. The crisis and terror of history are given expression in Urrea's mystical and apocalyptic pro- nouncements. In particular, the chaotic and oppressive circumstances of Mexican society during the dictatorship of Porfirio Diaz was confronted and denounced in Urrea's mystical and apocalyptic ministry. This apocalyptic healer castigated those culpable or even complicit with the injustices affecting the indigenous communities of Mexico during the late nineteenth century. In the case of Urrea, the transformation and healing of Church and society was an important aspect of her spiritual, healing powers. Because Urrea possessed neither arms nor the weapon of the pen, her sole weapon became her mystical experiences and the insight and healing powers that flowed from them. People of Mexico-especially indigenous groups-began to flock to her hoping that she would bring God's presence to the troubled and chaotic circumstances of their lives. Her compassion and tenderness for the afflicted as well as the apocalyptic expectations that she stirred up among the indigenous groups of Northern

Alex Nava is an assistant professor of classics and religious studies at the University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 8572-0067.

I am very grateful for the numerous suggestions and comments by the anonymous reviewer of this article. It would have been cumbersome to footnote every change and suggestion made by this reviewer because they were numerous. So this brief recognition will have to suffice.

Journal of the American Academy of Religion June 2005, Vol. 73, No. 2, pp. 497-519 doi: 10.1093/jaarel/lfi045 @ The Author 2005. Published by Oxford University Press, on behalf of the American Academy of Religion. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: [email protected]



498 Journal of the American Academy of Religion

Mexico were enough to get this mystical-political Mexican mestiza exiled from her homeland.

IN SPEAKING OF the literature of "magical realism," Gabriel Garcia Marquez once wrote that Latin American culture is "that boundless realm of haunted men and historic women ... that outsizes reality and nourishes a source of insatiable creativity" (Zamora: 133). In his view this penchant for representing and configuring the marvelous is in contrast to the "rational talents" of European thought. Although such a contrast can be overstated and misguided when essential stereotypes operate to reduce the profoundly diverse and pluralistic strands of any culture to one simple stereotype or picture, it is hard not to notice the attraction and allure in much of Latin America for the fantastic and wondrous. The promi- nence and authority of saints and healers or the multitude of narratives and festivals concerning apparitions of Christ, the Virgin Mary, and saints or spirits are part of this fascination with the mysterium fascinans, with that dimension of the human experience that we name the sacred. This encounter with the "marvel of being" is incarnated in a profuse number of forms: in ritual and festival, icon and symbol, art and music, in Baroque architecture, poetry and drama (Borges). Through these various forms the uncanny and fantastic make their presence felt in Latin America.

The life of Teresa Urrea (1873-1906) and the deep fascination that she exerted on many followers are another instance of lo real maravilloso in Latin America. By the age of sixteen this Mexican wonder-worker suc- ceeded in becoming a renowned healer, especially among the Yaqui and Mayo Indians of northern Mexico. One reporter from a newspaper in Las Cruces, New Mexico, reported that the day he went to visit her four to five thousand people crowded around her, many of them pilgrims from all parts of Mexico and some from the United States and other parts of Latin America. As her reputation continued to grow the crowds of the poor and handicapped, the disenfranchised and oppressed swelled. Com- prised largely of Indians the people saw in her a sign of God's concern for their affliction-whether physical, mental, or spiritual in nature.

One of the most inexplicable factors of her life consists in the political events that followed these healings and mass gatherings (gatherings part religious, part fiesta). During her lifetime various Yaqui and Mayo groups began revolutionary activity, striking at the government of the dictator Porfirio Diaz first at Tomochic and later at Nogales and other towns. Many of them were heard shouting with a violent fervor "Viva la Santa or Nifia de Cabora." By 1892 when Teresa was nineteen years old, she and her father were exiled from Mexico by the Mexican President Porfirio Diaz. Apparently to the president of Mexico, this young mystic and healer was dangerous.



Nava: Teresa Urrea 499

What are the circumstances that led this Mexican, indigenous healer to cause the powerful dictator Diaz to worry about her influence, indeed, to actually suspect her of being a revolutionary leader? Although this article hopes to shed some light on that question, there are major obstacles to answering this question with any degree of confidence. First of all, Teresa was, more than likely, non-literate. She did not leave us any writings of her own that would allow her to explain and interpret the events of her time as well as the religious experiences overwhelming her. Most of the information that we have of her is from newspaper reports. The information that they offer leaves many gaps, especially concerning the connection between her spiritual life and healings, on the one hand, and her relationship with various revolutionary groups, on the other. In spite of the fragmentary information about her life and ideas, however, there is a clear relationship between her healing and an apocalyptic sensibility that seems to pervade the events and experiences of both herself and her followers. That an age of healing, a time that would witness the lame walking, sight being given to the blind, hearing to the deaf, that this age might be associated with a final consummation of history, with a dramatic, possibly cataclysmic, spiritual revolution is not a very contentious a hypothesis. In the texts of the New Testament this association between Jesus' healing and the apocalyptic Kingdom of God that Jesus is ushering in is a prominent feature.

Regardless of one's skepticism or credence concerning these acts of healing, one thing is clear: Jesus' practices of healing were one dimension of a more holistic vision that addressed the struggles and suffering, the anguish and despair, of the people and society of his time. The life and message of Jesus surely resonated with a generation yearning for change and desperate for a better life. It is no wonder that this call for individual and social transformation provoked a violent response on the part of the Roman state that would lead to Jesus' persecution and death. Jesus' healing, thus, was part of an apocalyptic vision that would invoke a new age of justice and peace. In the eyes of the Romans, this was all too dangerous an invocation.

With Teresa the growing authority and power that she possessed to heal the bodies and spirits of others, especially the powerless and poor, became a dangerous gift that exposed the glaring faults and corruptions of Mexican society, economics, and culture under the Porfiriato. If Ter- esa insisted that her message was a purely spiritual one, it was a message that was no less revolutionary than other more strictly political ones. She was a mystical-political figure. Her apocalyptic messages, tied with the sheer number of followers flocking to be in her presence, if not actually crying out her name in subversive, revolutionary acts, made her a threat- ening figure to the stability of Diaz's dictatorship.




As Octavio Paz once noted, the attempts of modernization under the regime of Porfirio Diaz constructed altars to liberty and reason, science and progress (87). The ruling classes and intellectuals embraced positivism at this time not only as an intellectual trend but also as a justification for big landowners to add to their territories the lands of indigenous peoples. In the words of Paz:

Positivism in Latin America was not the ideology of a liberal bourgeoisie interested in industrial and social progress, as it was in Europe, but of an oligarchy of big landowners. . . . At the same time it was a radical criticism of religion and of traditional ideology. . . . The result might be called the dismantling of metaphysics and religion. (87-88)

Both of these factors-the oligarchy of big landowners and the positivistic criticism of religion-directly affected the lives of the Yaqui and Mayo Indians of Mexico. And surely this mysterious woman, Teresa Urrea, would come to be seen by the government as a threat to both of these programs under the Porfiriato. In the eyes of the government she represents a major impediment toward modernization, the stubborn refusal of indigenous communities to concede their territories. In her spiritual person and authority she represents the traditions that modernization is trying to evolve beyond, the ostensible superstitious and primitive world- views of Mexico's religious past.

Before examining the life and apocalyptic circumstances of this Mexican mestiza, I would insist that it is necessary to consider her potential contribution in light of the concerns and perspectives of our own academic and contemporary context. In this light there are two major objectives of this article. First, I examine Teresa as a mystical-political figure, especially in light of the apocalyptic milieu of Mexico at the turn of the century. As suggested above I believe that her healing ministry has to be understood in this context of apocalypticism and unrest. Secondly, the article interprets Teresa's healing practices as part of the indigenous traditions of Mexico and, furthermore, as a manifestation of archaic elements-expressed in the form of healing practices, myth, festival, and image-in the mystical events of her life. This aspect of her life allows us to appreciate the contributions of a non-literate, indigenous woman to the study of spirituality and religion.

MANIFESTATIONS OF THE SACRED IN THE LIFE OF TERESA URREA

Teresa Urrea was born in Sinaloa, Mexico, in 1873. She was an illegitimate child, born from the union of a prosperous Mexican hacienda




owner and a fourteen-year-old servant girl. Her mother was believed to be either Tehueco (Holden) or, more probable, Yaqui (Larralde). Urrea grew up with her mother, her aunt, and her aunt's family, all of whom worked on the hacienda of Tomais Urrea, Teresa's father. Not much is known about Teresa's childhood years except the fact that when she was seven years old her father took her with him to Sonora (apparently he was forced to leave Sinaloa for his support of the candidate whom Porfirio Diaz defeated in 1876). Her mother and her aunt's family were also brought to Sonora, and Teresa lived with them until the age of sixteen when she eventually went to live with her father at his ranch in Cabora.

When Teresa was sixteen certain religious and mystical experiences dramatically changed the direction of her life. We are told that she experienced seizures for almost thirteen days straight. During this time she is described as both weeping and smiling; the experience is described as both painful and pleasurable. For the next three months she was in a quasi-comatose state, in and out of consciousness. Although many began to predict her imminent death, she eventually recovered-or as others believe, was resurrected from the dead. During this period she had spoken vaguely of a commission received from God and the Virgin Mary. After a person was miraculously healed in her presence people began to come to her bedside in growing numbers.

Soon Teresa was working from early morning to night, healing and ministering to the sick and poor: people of various ethnicities, the crippled and paralyzed, the blind and deaf, cancer victims, the insane and disturbed, the hungry and thirsty. Usually Teresa would take the hands of the ill into her own and then stare deeply into their eyes. She claimed to possess an exceptional ability to see the cause of a person's troubles. "When sick people come to me, I can see where they are sick, just as if I were looking through a window" (Vanderwood 1998: 169).

What are we to make of these events in her life? The reports of them read like a Latin American novel of magical realism, filled with fantastic experiences and extraordinary powers resulting from these experiences. Was her comatose state a shaman-like trance? Mircea Eliade has said that shamanism is a technique of ecstasy in which the soul would leave its body to travel to another world (ek-stasis in Greek suggests to be outside of oneself). Ioan Couliano writes the following about shamans in Siberia:

Visited by the spirits, the shaman initially goes through a period of deep psychic depression and illness; these only subside when, having crossed the desert of death, he or she comes back to life and learns to control personal spirits in order to perform ecstatic journeys whose purpose is usually healing through exorcism. (40)




Besides her confrontation with death Teresa Urrea did indeed speak of her gift for spiritual journeys. She said that she could make her soul travel to wherever she desired, including the celestial regions. Teresa would free her spirit by lying down on her bed. Many thought her to be either asleep or crazy, as she once noted: "People think me crazy, not that I am violent, but I pay no attention to their questions and I say strange things" (Vanderwood 1998: 174). On one occasion she demonstrated an ability to bring a companion with her on such journeys. Josefa Felix, a friend of Teresa, once reported the following experience: "She woke me up when we were sleeping together and sent me to some place, and I was there immediately. We walked together and chatted" (Vanderwood 1998: 173).

She also claimed to have been able to see into the hearts and spirits of individuals, that no one could keep a secret from her. She apparently claimed to understand all languages. And almost certainly her ability to heal was a complement of her prophetic ability to see into the future, especially foretelling the arrival of death. Although Teresa never demanded worship in any way, it was clear to her that if not her body, her soul was quite special. "I do not ask any ceremony of you; God is the one you should worship. My body is the same as yours, but my soul is very different" (Vanderwood 1998: 171).

One key assumption of these shaman-like experiences is the claim that God is communicating with Teresa in a direct and unmediated manner. If mystics pose a threat to orthodoxy it is often because of this pre- sumption on the part of some mystics-though certainly not all-that the traditional intermediaries (church, sacraments, priests) are no longer necessary. God has spoken to them directly. In this sense mysticism is a direct or immediate consciousness of the Divine (McGinn: xvii). Although the goal of mysticism has traditionally been expressed in a vari- ety of ways-union with God, vision of God, or spiritual messengers, auditions, ecstasy, and rapture, birth of the Word in the soul, deification, soul's journey to the heavens-one underlying theme is the assumption that God has communicated to the recipient in a special, intense, and direct manner. Such a communication is initiated by the divine and comes upon the mystic suddenly and unexpectedly. Even though there are forms of preparation for such extraordinary events in the lives of most mystics, especially various spiritual practices from meditation to asceticism, the self-manifestation of God in the life of a mystic is more often described as uncontrollable and unearned, gratuitous and gracious. Not surprisingly, this special revelation grants a power and authority to the recipient otherwise denied her or him by the formal institutions of religion, especially in the case of women.




In the case of Urrea the spiritual events she experienced do not place a priority on traditional themes such as union with God, ecstasy or rapture, or deification. Because she was not familiar with the classic Christian mystics, her understanding of spirituality was shaped by the popular religious traditions of Mexico at this time. In this case, then, we might suggest that the traditions that did nurture her consciousness were a combination of Mexican, indigenous shamanism, and folk Catholi- cism, rather than traditional Christian mysticism. With that said, I would insist, however, that these terms-mysticism and shamanism-are not mutually exclusive and that characteristics of shamanism clearly surface in classic mystics (e.g., in her work Showings Julian of Norwich describes a journey to the ocean depths and to the heavens; or Dante's Divine Com- edy is nothing other than an allegorical journey of the soul into hell and eventually paradise). The traditions of shamanism represent the archaic and pagan traditions of Christianity, especially evident in the mystical traditions (the "pagani" originally implied in Latin the rural, folk traditions of the people). If Urrea owes more to these "pagan," indigenous traditions of Mexico than to classic Christian mysticism, we do not have to conclude therefore that the term mystical is entirely inappropriate in her case. She did, after all, consider herself Catholic, and her spiritual experiences were often of Christian figures, such as God the Father, the Virgin Mary (especially Guadalupe), and the angel Gabriel. The terms shaman and mystic are both appropriate in her case.

To return to the effects of her growing spiritual authority, the fruit of Urrea's special revelations led to consequences most feared by church orthodoxy, namely, the bestowing of sacramental authority upon lay people. Teresa seems to have contended that all have a calling and thus have the power to baptize, confirm, and perform marriage ceremonies. The Church as mediator is not always necessary, as in the case of prayer. A Spiritist from Guaymas who claimed to know Teresa, Lauro Aguirre, had this to say about Teresa's view of prayer:

Prayer was like talking to a revered friend, one in whom she felt the utmost trust. Prayers should be offered with profound feeling, should be soul-stirring and heartfelt. She objected to the prayers of priests- empty, external, impersonal, without feeling; simply memorized pas- sages.... (Vanderwood 1998: 187)

Teresa was critical of the Catholic Church in Mexico and called for dramatic changes in the Church, especially in the social mission of the Church. Indeed, after the release of the first social encyclical Rerum Novarum in the 1890s, many said that Teresa had foreseen the promulgation of this




document. Prior to its release she apparently told a reporter that "In Italy discussion is already underway with the Pope and truth will triumph" (Vanderwood 1998: 188). Whether or not she predicted this encyclical, it is clear that the reform that she was advocating included a concern for the poor and disenfranchised at the heart of her vision for a new, healthier society.

Many of these characteristics of Teresa's life (healings, soul journeys, divine apparitions, etc.) were very much part of the popular religion of Mexico, especially among the indigenous groups. Although Teresa considered herself Catholic, it was clearly a deeply syncretistic form of Catholicism. This form of Catholicism, as the work of Virgilio Elizondo has long argued, is the fruit of a mestizaje, of the interpenetration of European Christianity and the indigenous traditions of the "New World" (9-13). Cultural hybridity are the marks of Latin American religious identity. No doubt, in the aftermath of the Conquest, the indigenous traditions undergo profound transformation, but Christianity also endures a profound reformation. Negotiation and cultural change are inescapable realities not only in the case of Christianity and the indigenous traditions of the Americas but of the human experience per se. Study of the figure Urrea and of the popular religious traditions of Mexico and Latin America demonstrate well the suggestion that Quetzalcoatl has survived the Conquest (Lafaye).

One important indigenous influence on the early life of Teresa, for instance, was one of Tomas Urrea's servants, the Yaqui curandera Huila. It was Huila who would have put her on the path of a healer through guidance on the proper use of plants and herbs and the necessary prayers to accompany them. Still, although Huila may have guided her in a particular direction, nothing could have prepared her for the unexpected and transforming experiences during and following her comatose period. And certainly no one could have imagined the masses of people who would soon be flocking in her direction.

After this comatose period Teresa demonstrated a determined and single-minded sense of mission. Apparently Teresa healed through various methods, but the most common was the mixing of her saliva with the dirt of the earth, a practice she learned from the curandera Huila. Besides suggesting the intimacy of our connection with the natural world, this practice is reminiscent of Jesus' own practices of healing. Concerning her healing ministry, Urrea is reported to have said, "I should like to heal all humanity ... I wish I might gather it in my arms and heal it so" (Vanderwood 1998: 185). Given the tenderness and motherly affection that she demonstrated here, it is no wonder that Teresa saw her own life and mission as devoted to the Virgin Mary, particularly the figure of




Guadalupe. She claimed that the Virgin Mary told her to communicate a message of love, that all should love one another and everyone should treat each other as equals. Surely such an egalitarian vision resonated with the hopes of the people around her, especially among the Yaqui and Mayo communities. Her divine mandate to heal others went deeper than treating physical illness, then; she constantly spoke of healing society's woes, of healing the wounds of her people.

It is well known that the conditions of the Yaqui people in Mexico were especially deplorable at this time. The Mexican government believed that the modernization of Mexico depended upon the control of the rich farmland of many indigenous communities. In the nineteenth century, after Mexican independence in 1821, the government began to encroach upon sacred Yaqui lands. This was met with strong resistance, especially under the leadership of figures such as Juan Banderas (who in the 1920s and 1930s sought to unite the Indians of northwest Mexico under the flag of Montezuma and Our Lady of Guadalupe) and Cajeme (a leader of the Yaqui Wars of the 1880s). From the time of Juan Banderas to that of Cajeme there were many outbursts of guerilla warfare followed by brutal retaliation on the part of the government. In 1868, for instance, Mexican soldiers imprisoned more than 400 men, women, and children in a church at Bacum. Subsequently, the soldiers were ordered to set fire to the church and to shoot anyone attempting to flee.

In the early 1900s conditions of only the Yaquis worsened. The Mexican government and the state of Sonora undertook a massive deportation and slave labor program. As one historian puts it,

This final solution, which could have amounted to genocide were it not abruptly curtailed, was the massive and systematic deportation of all Yaquis out of Sonora. ... More than any military campaigns, deportation eventually broke down the spirit of the Yaquis, who could not sustain the resistance when they were physically dispersed and their families wantonly torn apart. (Hu-DeHart: 155)

According to Edward Spicer the Yaquis "had become the most widely scattered native people in North America" (158).

In the context of these violent, abusive events, religion not only funct- ioned as an opiate (in Marx's positive sense of the term, as "the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, the soul of soulless conditions") but often included a vision of justice in the here and now. As Ana Maria Alonso has shown, the religious perspectives of many communities in Mexico at the time had sophisticated, prophetic understandings of their predicaments. They were anything but naive,




superstitious fanatics. Such a characterization of these groups, in particular the Tomochi rebels, was "disseminated by the Porfirian government to depoliticize and trivialize the rebels' cause" (Alonso: 206). The mystical- political dimensions of the Tomochi rebels and of the followers of Teresa Urrea should signal to us the inextricable ties of religion and politics in these communities.

If popular religion provided the people with a hope for a better, more just world, in late nineteenth century Mexico it also channeled the people's anger and dissatisfaction with abusive authorities, as in the case of the caciques. While the term cacique is a colonial reinterpretation of traditional leadership, at this time in northern Mexico the term cacique came to mean a "political boss" whose rule is based on force and corrup- tion, aggressiveness and greed. A son of one of the Tomochi rebel leaders, Placido Chaivez Calder6n, made the following comment about the caciques in Mexico at this time:

In the time of the regime of Porfirio Diaz, all of the cities, all of the towns, and all of the villages had their caciques and their Judases, and just as Judas Escariot, for thirty gold coins, sold his Lord so that he would be crucified, so in Tomochi the Judases . . . with lies, with intrigues, with calumnies, and with hatred and cowardice, consigned the pueblo to misery and poverty, to hardships, to suffering, and finally to the sacrifice and extermination of the majority of its inhabitants. (Alonso: 205)

The intersection of biblical narrative and contemporary politics illus- trated in this comment is not uncommon and communicates the senti- ment of the people of Tomochi and the followers of Teresa Urrea. Their form of folk Catholicism was a politicized, egalitarian vision of the biblical heritages. It was not a version of a purely other-worldly Christianity. Again, in the words of Alonso: "Thus, the Tomochis' charismatic folk Catholicism was part of a broader, politicized and this-worldly vision of social dislocation.. ." (206).

Teresa Urrea's own understanding of religion occupies this border territory between mysticism and politics, this region of the hyphen between the mystical-political.' She was too vigilant, too implicated in the historical circumstances of her people not to notice the events of the world around her. Concerning the mistreatment of the Yaqui Indians of Mexico, she had this to say:

'My own work on Simone Weil and Gustavo Gutierrez traces and explores this connection between mysticism and political/prophetic thought (see Nava).




I never led the Yaquis to battle, but I did sympathize with them. My father employed them on his hacienda and I knew and loved them. I have seen the many wrongs. Before my eyes children not three years old have been lynched, hanged from trees. . .. by order of the military commander of the Sonora District to keep the Yaquis down. Do you wonder why the tribe fights the forces of such a government? My poor Indians! They are the bravest and most persecuted people on earth. God help them! There are few of them left. (Vanderwood 1998: 185)

In an even more subversive vein she was reported to have said to repre- sentatives of the Yaqui and Mayo Indians that, "God intended for you to have the lands or He would not have given them to you." (Rodriguez: 188). If she did make such a statement, then it is less perplexing why these groups appealed to this Mexican healer as inspiration for their struggles for justice. But what else is there to this connection between her spiritual mission and the political unrest in Mexico at this time? My suggestion is that there is an apocalyptic atmosphere that Teresa confirmed and further intensified. Before exploring this apocalyptic dimension, however, it is important to clarify further the archaic dimension lying beneath the mysticism and healing in the life of Urrea.

TERESA URREA AS INDIGENOUS MYSTIC

Beyond the flirtation with wonder, mystical voices attest to the persistence of repressed, marginal, and archaic traditions. The path- breaking work of Gershom Scholem on Jewish mysticism, for example, demonstrated the continuing presence of mythical and archaic symbols, not to mention sexual metaphors and experiences, in the Kabbalah (87- 117). This view of Judaism was almost lost in favor of the prophetic, historical, monotheistic, and ethical trajectory of Judaism. The work of Mircea Eliade as well served to challenge the neglect of archaic religious traditions, those religions too often named "primitive" or dismissed as superstitious and naive. Eliade's work on ancient myths, rituals, festivals, icons, or saints showed how these forms of human experience disclose a sense of belonging and participating in sacred space and time, in nature and cosmos. David Tracy has spoken of this trajectory of religious expression as "manifestation." "We find this reality of manifestation," Tracy writes,

Really alive in the West, if at all, only in rural cultures; in urban settings, only in the vague remnants of the cosmic in the liturgies of an ethical and historical Judaism and Christianity, only in the troubled archetypal




dreams of the night, in the ecstasy of sexual expression, in the disturbing underflow of our unconscious, in the desperation of our fascination with fantasy, astrology, alchemy, science fiction, and the "East" we insist on calling "mysterious" and the archaic cultures we insist on labeling "primitive".... (206-207)

We find confirmation of these traditions, this article contends, in the indigenous cultures that nurtured the life of Teresa Urrea.

Her own healing ability is clearly connected with a feeling of participation with the natural world and with the cosmos as a whole; her journeys of the soul make possible a special, direct connection with the divine; her prophetic sense of the future is linked to her vision of human history and the responsibilities and expectations of human beings therein; her compassion for the afflicted Indians of Mexico illustrates her connectedness with all of life, especially the lives of the disenfranchised. All these gifts and faces of Teresa Urrea make it impossible to miss the distinct and original character of her life. Urrea demands attention not in spite of her non-literate, mestiza character but precisely because she is a voice of the voiceless masses, of the rural and indigenous traditions of Mexico. If not in the form of writing, then it is through her healing activities and spiritual authority that she becomes a powerful representative of these overlooked traditions. Her distinctive contribution to the study of religion is here, in the border regions between European religion and spirituality and that of the indigenous heritages of the Mexico.

The historian of religion, then, has long insisted that religious studies must attend to indigenous and primal traditions, that the sole study of western, monotheistic religions is, at best, limited and, at worst, Eurocen- tric and imperialistic. The voices of the mystics can help us begin to hear others, whether that means the otherness of forgotten and subjugated indigenous traditions or the otherness deep within our very selves.

Teresa Urrea can aide us in this regard. Although the study of classic Christian mystics is indispensable to exploring the history and develop- ment of the phenomenon of mysticism, attention to the mestiza Urrea- a figure in the border territory between Christianity and indigenous religions-can help us uncover the archaic and indigenous elements of mysticism. The life and experiences of Teresa reflect not only Catholic Christian beliefs but also the traditions of the Yaqui and Mayo peoples of northern Mexico. Teresa is a representative of the non-literate and poor, of individuals and communities rarely considered by intellectuals. Through her mystical experiences, her healing ministry, and through her apocalyptic judgments, these groups had a voice that comforted many as well as disturbed and threatened the powers that be.




APOCALYPTICISM AND EXILE

One helpful definition of the term apocalypse is as follows:

Apocalypse is a genre of revelatory literature with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both tempo- ral, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial insofar as it involves another, supernatural world. (Collins: 4)

Although neither Teresa nor many of the indigenous groups of Mexico produced a genre of literature, the apocalyptic circumstances, symbols, and ideas in their lives are unmistakable. As John Collins explains the main means of revelation in apocalyptic events are visions, raptures, and otherworldly journeys (4-5). The element of otherworldly travel reflects the spatial dimension of the transcendent reality being disclosed. One constant presence in apocalypticism, for instance, is the presence of an otherworldly being, such as an angel or a venerable ancestor or saint (e.g., the Virgin Mary or the Angel Gabriel in the case of Teresa). The presence of such a figure indicates the esoteric or mysterious nature of the revelation; understanding requires interpretation on the part of the mediating being. Once this hidden world becomes known and intelligible to the human recipient, however, insight and spiritual knowledge concerning human destiny and human history are made manifest.

Thus, human destinies and human history are deciphered using the visions and/or journeys as proleptic clues. This history, however, is anything but coherent or linear. History is read as disruptive and chaotic in apocalypticism. Crisis, terror, and eschatological upheaval are the signs of the times, not order and peace. As Johann Baptist Metz put it in his classic work Faith in History and Society, "We can see man's consciousness of catastrophe as expressed in the apocalyptic vision basically as a consciousness of time... of the character of discontinuity and the end of time. These were times of crisis, persecution, large-scale injustice and hatred" (175-176).

History, furthermore, is also the location of the final struggle between the good and wicked, interpreted in terms that include not only human actors but cosmic principalities and agents as well (e.g., angels and demons). A final judgment and destruction of the wicked are envisaged that includes retribution beyond the bounds of history. If justice here and now is rare and elusive, then perhaps at the end of history or beyond history itself justice might "roll down like an overflowing fountain and righteousness like a mighty stream" (Amos 5:24). Such was the nature of history to many of the indigenous groups of Mexico at the turn of the




century, if not still today. One of these groups, in particular, turned to Teresa as a sign of hope amidst the terror of history.

Although this Jewish-Christian apocalyptic framework is illuminating to understand Urrea and her times, there are parallels with this apocalyptic vision among the indigenous traditions.2 A contemporary figure of Urrea, a Mayo Indian prophet by the name of Damian Quijano had been drawing upon Mayo mythology in a manner that had explicit political implications. In accord with Mayo tradition he had been predicting a great flood that would purify the earth by destroying the wicked and saving the righteous (the fact that Mayo settlements along the Fuerte River had periodically been devastated by flash floods made the threat of a flood very real and daunting). The flood mythos among the Mayo at this time seems to have been a syncretistic version of both the indigenous traditions and that of the Judeo-Christian traditions. In both cases the notion that the Father will soon bring punishment to an errant people, especially to the unjust powers of the world, resonated clearly with the Mayo communities.

In order to survive the imminent flood Quijano advised the people to gather at the slightly elevated land of rancho Jambiobampo. When news reached the ears of Colonel Antonio Rinc6n, in charge of keeping peace among the Mayo, he went to investigate and met with Quijano. Fearing that this large gathering might escalate into overt rebellion (the colonel was well aware of the fact that Damidn's uncle, Cirilo, had fought with the most feared Yaqui leader, Cajeme), he had Quijano and some sixty of his closest followers arrested. He also initiated at this time a repressive campaign to investigate and arrest other "Santos" in the socially disturbed regions of the Mayo. There was a Santa Camilia in the forests of Ilibaqui; Santa Isabel at Macochi; Santa Augustina at Baburo; San Juan and La Luz at Cohirimpo; San Luis at Tenanchopo; and San Irenio at rancho Sapochopo (Vanderwood 1998: 195). Many of these figures and their followers were arrested and sentenced to work in the mines of Baja California. Throughout this repression none of the Mayo revealed a word about their most significant sacred leader, La Santa de Cabora, Teresa Urrea.

2 Parallels of these apocalyptic visions can also be found among the North American Native communities. The apocalyptic tone of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Mexico has remarkable affinities with resistance movements in North America, especially with the Ghost Dance traditions. The leaders of this movement, the northern Paiute Indians Gray Hair and Wovoka, also invoked an apocalyptic vision that integrated Christianity with indigenous traditions. And such a vision was given to them, we are told, as the result of a trance, during which they were transported to the otherworld and told three things: that the dead would return, the game animals would return, and that old tribal life would be resurrected (Hultkrantz: 201-205). The belief that the dancing would accompany and precipitate the destruction of the rule of the "White Man" became a mark of this tradition among the Plains Indians in particular.




Around this same time in 1890 a group of less than hundred men, mainly Indians, in the village of Tomochic initiated a movement that would soon draw the attention of all of Mexico. Denouncing the government and secular authorities they swore to obey the authority of God and no one else. Led by a lay leader of the local Church, Cruz Chavez, this group was heard shouting some of the following slogans, "Viva el poder de Dios" (Long live the power of God), "Muera el mal gobierno" (Death to bad government), "Viva el poder de la Santisima Virgen y la Santa de Cabora" (Long live the power of the blessed Virgin and the saint of Cabora). Cruz Chavez admonished his fellow Tomochitecos not to be afraid, for the bullets of the devil cannot penetrate the bodies of the righteous (Vanderwood 1998: 4). With obvious and unambiguous dualisms Chavez called the agents of the government the "sons of Satan" and his own people the righteous. That this confrontation between the government and the people of Tomochic might signal the final apocalyptic battle between the wicked and the good was not lost upon a person like Cruz Chaivez. Before these events the people of Tomochic believed that signs of the end times had already manifested themselves in their presence. They had come across a humble man and a pregnant woman on a journey by mule. They called them "los viejitos" and interpreted them as a new Mary and Joseph, come to announce the arrival of a new, messi- anic age in which the wicked would be punished and the righteous rewarded. In short they judged the eschaton to be upon them.

What do we know of Teresa's part in this call for battle against the forces of Satan? For one it is very likely that the Yaquis and Mayos saw in Teresa's healing power and prophetic insight a further sign of the imminent inter- vention of God in history. Secondly there are some messages attributed to Teresa that have a clear apocalyptic sensibility. One case of this is a letter she says she received from Christ through the angel Gabriel (and the presence of an angel, let us recall, is a clue to apocalyptic proclamations):

If my sacred heart had not burned with woe for me, I should long ago have cast them into the depths of hell for their terrible offenses... I have shed my precious blood upon the cross in order that they may have time to repent of sins. Now, if they do not do so, I will make them feel the rigor of my justice; I will visit them with sickness, and I will hasten the judgment day when the good will be separated from the wicked. (Vanderwood 1998: 162)

This type of revelation from the angel Gabriel is by no means unique in the history of Mexico. There are countless instances of such revelations in Latin America and beyond. Beyond the actual content of such a message




the circumstances and social context are significant. These kind of divine communications are profuse during times of crisis and catastrophe. Like anyone else burdened by the weight of suffering Teresa sought to explain the cause of her people's suffering and to suggest a remedy. The targets of her denunciations and rebukes were various authorities from the wealthy, caciques, and the government to the Church and physicians. She called for the repentance of everyone, but certainly had in mind the need for conversion of some more than others: "I desire that all people," Ter- esa remarked, "should repent in their hearts, have care of their souls, adore and venerate the Holy Mother Mary ... give to the needy and do evil to no one" (Vanderwood 1998: 186).

To return to the events at Tomochic, by 1890 the government had sent soldiers and militia to subdue the rebels. The Tomochitecos were defeated, but most of them escaped and decided to travel to visit their Santa Teresa. Their journey to visit Teresa was further proof, contended Mexican government officials, of Teresa's support of anti-Porfirian rebels. Because of time spent in hiding they did not arrive until 1892 and discov- ered that Teresa was not around. They were reported as spending much time in prayer for justice, in prayer for a world free of suffering. Chavez then decided to return to Tomochic, probably expecting to die but also anticipating that his actions would serve as a catalyst for an apocalyptic resolution to the agony of history. Upon his return Chavez sought to cre- ate an egalitarian society and rebuked the appeals of the government for negotiation. Eventually along with over 400 soldiers, General Jose Maria Rangel was sent by President Diaz finally and permanently to end the problem of Tomochic. In now what has become a legendary battle, the people of Tomochic defeated the general. Embarrassed by the defeat General Rangel soon elicited the support of Colonel Lorenzo Torres and over 1200 soldiers marched on Tomochic and crushed the rebellion. The soldiers subsequently burned a church in which many women and children were being held. Teresa was reported to have wept for the people, soon considered martyrs by many Mexicans.

This is another instance of the notorious injustice of the Porfirian regime. In addition to the massive slave deportation program among the Yaqui and the advance of big landowners on indigenous native lands, the Mexican government of the late nineteenth century began to see spiritual and religious behavior as a roadblock on the path to Enlightenment and modern progress. Even among intellectual elites, Octavio Paz has argued, there was a spiritual void created by the rational and scientific "signs of the times." The literary movement known as modernismo, for instance, emerged at this time to respond to the spiritual vacuity of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. "Among us modernismo was the




response needed to contradict the spiritual vacuum created by the positivistic criticism of religion and metaphysics. . . . Modernismo answered spiritual needs. Or, more precisely, it was the answer of imagination and sensibility to the positivist drought" (Paz: 89). If the government's adop- tion of positivism troubled many intellectuals-and led them to other wells of inspiration, especially to European romanticism and the avant- garde-the effects of the Porfirian regime were far more troubling and brutal to the masses of the people, especially to indigenous communities. Violence and oppression were the fate that many of the poor of Mexico would endure. Nietzsche was certainly correct when he commented about many of the ideals of the Enlightenment: "Ah, reason, reflection, objecti- vity: how much blood and violence lie at the bottom of these things." (29).

If the intellectual elites turned to modernismo to answer spiritual needs, the indigenous people of Mexico turned to charismatic leaders who would not only address the hunger of the human soul but who would also attend to the needs of the human body, whether diseased or simply hungry. Exposure of the injustices of the government unavoidably accompanied the spiritual visions of many of these leaders. The spiritual events and circumstances of the life and times of Teresa Urrea are instances of what the government most feared: prophetic voices denouncing inequality, prejudice, and oppression.

In the mind of Porfirio Diaz and his government, then, there was ample evidence for Teresa's involvement, if not direct participation, in the political unrest that would soon lead to the Mexican Revolution. Indeed, in another incident, the Mexican government actually attacked a fiesta where Teresa was healing the sick and shot some of her followers (Sheridan: 41). Irrespective of the message of Teresa, the simple fact that these mass gatherings were potential hotbeds for disruptive, subversive activities surely troubled the Mexican government. Clearly Diaz had come to believe she was dangerous. The president, therefore, had Teresa and her father exiled from Mexico. Subsequently, Teresa and her father settled down in Nogales, Arizona (where allegedly the Mexican government made attempts on her life) (Newell: 42).

This was not the end of Teresa's influence, however. Other revolts ensued during the time of her exile also invoking her name: in 1891 there was a Mayo attack on the town of Navajoa, with the men invoking the name "la Santa de Cabora," and in 1893 revolts at Santo Tomas and Temosachic, and in 1896 a raid on a customs house in Nogales, Mexico. In this latter incident a band of Yaqui Indians killed several officials and plundered a customs house shouting "Viva la Nifia de Cabora." While some of this band of Yaquis escaped, a few of them were slain and upon their bodies were found religious objects with the name and image of la




Nifia. More significantly, however, a letter was supposedly found which demonstrated Teresa's sanctioning and even planning of the raid (Vanderwood 1998). Other rebellions also occurred in Chihuahua from 1892 to 1896. Although it is unclear what role Teresa may have played in these events, it is known that the rebellion of Tomochic certainly inspired this spirit of unrest in northern Mexico. And we must remember, furthermore, that the Mexican Revolution of 1910 begins in the northern state of Chihuahua. A figure like Teresa Urrea, despite her protestations to the contrary, was indeed a dangerous figure, one whom the Mexican government justly feared.

And so were other folk saints dangerous. Besides some of the figures mentioned above among the Mayo, many folk saints/healers appear around this time along the US-Mexico border, such as Nifio Fidencio, Pedro Jaramillo, and Juan Soldado (see Leon). It is clear that the popu- larity of such religious figures represents and confirms the large-scale dissatisfaction and unease/disease among the people which simultaneously has religious, social, political, and economic dimensions. The widespread spiritual and religious behavior of the masses of the people in Mexico surely cannot be ignored as a prelude to the Mexican Revolution. The events of the life of Teresa Urrea are a good example of the convergence of interests among indigenous communities and spiritual leaders, on the one hand, and the Mexican revolutionaries, on the other.

Because of the evidence of Urrea's connection with the abovemen- tioned rebellions, Mexico sought to have her extradited, but the United States refused, citing lack of evidence for her political activity. The United States did urge her, however, to move further away from the border, so she and her father relocated to Clifton, Arizona. This concern about her prox- imity to the border was well-founded, because it is known that many Mexicans, including political dissenters and exiles fled to see her across the border in the United States. According to one newspaper the region where Teresa settled called El Bosque was more than a place for the sick:

This place became the mecca for pilgrims seeking cures from as far away as Sinaloa. Not only the sick and crippled came, but poltical refugees as well. Nogales and El Bosque became the rendevous for revolutionaries plotting the overthrow of the Diaz government. (Rodgriguez: 188)

The journey of this charismatic figure to el Norte in itself has great signifi- cance and comes to represent her status as a border figure, as a liminal figure in-between not only mysticism and political/apocalyptic action, as this article has argued, but also in the more obvious sense of "border figure," as someone on the periphery, in "no man's land," in between the




North and the South. Not surprisingly, such a figure becomes to later Mexican-Americans, especially to the Chicano movement, an influential foremother. Although the reception of Urrea's legacy is beyond the scope of this article, I will at least note one comment about her legacy by the Chicano scholars Alfredo Mirande and Evangelina Enriquez:

Perhaps her personal motivation is unimportant, for regardless of her motives, there can be no doubt that she played a critical role in the shaping of history ... Teresa Urrea served as precursor not only to the Mexican revolution but of Chicano political movements and remains a symbol of resistance to oppression for contemporary Chicanos. (177-178)

CONCLUSION

The interaction between mysticism and politics in the life of Teresa Urrea is an intriguing and fascinating story. As argued in this article mysticism manifests primal and archaic experiences and traditions. Teresa's mystical experiences point to a greater awareness of her participation in the natural world, especially through her spiritual art of healing. Her knowledge of plants and herbs, or the mixing of saliva with the dirt of the earth, reveal her spiritual insight into the life of bodies, human and animal bodies as well as the body of the earth. But, as we have learned, there is much more to her effects than her mystical insight and healing ministry. Her mysticism is tied to apocalypticism.3 As noted above this apocalyptic dimension is more than a communication of a hidden message or spiritual world; it also includes a reading of history that is catastrophic and discontinuous. The crisis and terror of history are given expression in apocalyptic pro- nouncements. The context of Urrea's life-one that included persecution, unrest, and assault on the indigenous communities of Mexico-surely had apocalyptic undertones.

It is this connection between mysticism and apocalypticism that infuses her life and social-religious circumstances with a historical, political dimension. Mysticism is attractive to some for its ability to offer us an ecstatic glimpse of the eternal, a release from the terror of history. While Teresa Urrea tasted such ecstasy, her involvement in society is unwaver- ing. Her communications with the divine never tempted her to flee from the particularities of the history and society around her. The face of the

3 The mystical theology of Hildegaard of Bingen is another example of a mystical vision tied to an apocalyptic sensibility. See Hildegaard. Perhaps a closer analogue to Teresa Urrea is the figure of Ann Lee, the founder of the Shaker movement. In addition to having a strong apocalyptic sensibility, Lee was illiterate and derived her power and influence from her direct communication with the Divine rather than through the power of the pen. See Francis.




other, the face of her own people, the poor and infirm, the Indians and mestizos of Mexico stood out boldly to her, and she never averted her gaze from them.

In the history of Christian mysticism it is still a rarity to find a mystical voice that represents the experiences and struggles of the non-literate and poor. In the late Middle Ages mystical thinkers such as Eckhart and the community of the Beguines made inroads in this regard. They sought to bring the mystical life to the toils, struggles, and hopes of ordinary people. Along these lines, one mystical theologian, Jean Gerson, contended that even simple women and idiotae can become mystics; a higher education is not a prerequisite (Ozment: 73-79). Although Teresa was indeed a simple woman, her religious experiences and her commitment to the indigenous peoples of Mexico were anything but simple. The revelations that came to her gave her a spiritual power and influence that she would soon come to regard, not unlike many of the classical prophets, with ambivalence. They became sources of more than God's comforting presence; they also brought her turmoil, suffering, and exile.

Although this reference to Urrea's place in the history of Christian mysticism is important for understanding her place in the history of the West, it should be clear by now that she does not fit the mold of a classic Christian mystic. As a non-literate woman without formal education, she does not leave us with a clear record of her thoughts and experiences. Her major universe was not the tradition of Christian mysticism but instead that of the indigenous cultures of northern Mexico. The shamanistic dimension of her life and thought is unmistakable and should prevent any interpreter from only considering her in light of Christianity. Her voice is one that is part of a Catholic Christian vision, but at the same time it is a voice that transgresses this vision, or at least adds to it the rural, "pagan" traditions of Mexico. The contention of this article is that these elements of her life and thought can be interpreted as a strength, that because of this fact she allows us a glimpse into the spiritual universe of the poor and oppressed in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Mexico as well as those communities along the US-Mexico border.

One reason for her commitment to the poor and sick of Mexico is that she shared their status. In spite of being born of a wealthy father, she never forgot that she was half Indian and illegitimate at that. For this reason her concern for the well-being of Indians and the poor was not tainted by the condescending pity or paternalism that one might find among some of the liberal intellectuals of her day ("liberal" under the Porfiriato suggested an enthusiasm for modernization and the indigenous were consistently regarded as obstacles to modern progress). Her solidarity with the indigenous groups of Mexico was formed by a life among them, by her total




devotion to their well being. The spiritual therapy she provided had both a private and public aim, which explains why it could be so troubling to the authorities of Mexico. She ardently wanted to provide a panacea not only for the sick and crippled but for society as a whole. And this mission found many eager allies and followers in the Indians of Mexico.

As suggested earlier her desire to heal at both individual and social levels is allied with an apocalyptic vision. This apocalyptic healer castigated those culpable or even complicit with the injustices of Mexican society during the dictatorship of Porfirio Diaz. It is this message that rang so true to many indigenous groups struggling for recognition in Mexico. In the case of La Santa de Cabora the transformation of society and church was an important aspect of her spiritual, healing powers. Without possessing armed weapons, nor possessing the weapon of the pen, her sole weapon became her mystical experiences and the insight and healing powers that flowed from them.

It would not be too fanciful to regard Teresa Urrea's entire life as a symbol of the fantastic and marvelous nature of Latin American culture. She is an embodiment, in a way, of what Alejo Carpentier once called lo real maravilloso:

The marvelous begins to be unmistakably marvelous when it arises from an unexpected alteration of reality (the miracle), from a privileged revelation of reality, an unusual insight that particularly favors the unexpected richness of reality or an amplification of the scale and categories of reality, a reality thus perceived with special intensity by virtue of an exaltation of the spirit that leads it to a kind of extreme state. (Zamora: 120-121)

But the people of Mexico and of the border regions do not flock to her simply for a taste of the magical. They come to her seeking her spiritual power, seeking to be touched by her compassion, expecting that she would bring God's presence to the troubled and chaotic circumstances of their lives. Her compassion and tenderness for the afflicted as well as the hopes and apocalyptic expectations that she stirred up among the indigenous groups of Mexico were enough to get this mystical-political, Mexican mestiza exiled from her homeland.

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teresa urrea: mexican mystic, healer, and apocalyptic revolutionary

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