Role of Christianity and Missionaries, Questionnaire Example

The missionaries and Christianity played a crucial role in transforming the culture of the Mesoamericans during the Spanish conquest of the American land. The missionaries had a relentless drive to convert the Mesoamericans to Catholics. The people were influenced to accept the practices and customs and that embraced Catholicism as a religion and as a way of life. The conversion process was faced with a lot of difficulties as the people were not ready to change. The natives Mesoamericans strongly believed in their religious practices and cultures, they made idols and images from valuable items such as gold and silver to be their gods. These images and idols were later destroyed by the missionaries and the valuable metals were melted and exported to Spain[1].

The missionaries also influenced the language of the people, as they had to teach and preach their religion in their native language. This therefore saw the need to force the native people to adopt the language and use it in communicating with missionaries. The missionaries were the used by the Spain government to spread their policies as they taught the religion to the people. They had the view that everybody who was a non-catholic was a pagan and people from different religions such as Islamic and traditional religions forcefully baptized to Christianity and given new names. Religious purification could only be obtained through Christianity. Submission to the King of Spain could only be expressed through conversion to Christianity and thereby forcing many Indians to accept Christianity as their religion. In certain cases those who resisted the conversion were taken to captivity or even killed[2].

References

Tibesar, A.S. (2010). “The Franciscan Province of the Holy Cross of Espanañola, 1505-1559”. The Americas 13 (4): 377–389.

Zinn, H. (2009). A People’s History Of The United States. New York: The New Press. p. 281. ISBN 978-1-56584-724-8.

[1] Zinn, H. (2009). A People’s History Of The United States. New York: The New Press. p. 281. ISBN 978-1-56584-724-8.

[2] Tibesar, A.S. (2010). “The Franciscan Province of the Holy Cross of Espanañola, 1505-1559”. The Americas 13 (4): 377–389.