Category: Contemplation and silence

  • Transfiguraciones mayas Acto cultural de los 500 OP Chiapas

    Mayan transfigurations Cultural event of the 500 OP Chiapas

    Welcome remarks

    By Carlos Mendoza Álvarez

    Good afternoon, dear brothers and sisters:

    This cultural event in the public square of the municipality of Zinacantán is a symbol of the dialogue between faith and reason that has been at the heart of the preaching of the Gospel, from its origins in the lands of Palestine with Jesus of Nazareth, two thousand years ago, to the present day in the Highlands of Chiapas.

    Jesus of Galilee was a preacher of good news for humanity, standing up to the powerful of his time, and accompanied by his messianic community even though he was betrayed by an angry mob.

    Jesus' loving sacrifice for a humanity reconciled with itself and with Mother Earth acquires a cosmic force with his resurrection from the dead, which is the most radical good news of all time.

    God is not a God of the dead, but of the living. And that is why the God of life is always on the side of the poor, the excluded, and the vulnerable, so that from there he may call everyone—victims and executioners alike—to heal humanity's mortal wounds and lead us to his fullness of life.

    On the occasion of the arrival of the first Dominican friars to the mainland of Abya Yala of the native peoples, five centuries ago on the coasts of Veracruz in 1526, we Dominican friars of today long to make a joyful, yet critical, memory of those five centuries of encounters and disagreements with the peoples of Mexico, especially those of Chiapas.

    The dialogue between faith and reason, we Dominican friars have promoted for eight centuries in spirituality, thought and the arts, always accompanied by the promotion of human dignity and its inalienable human rights, through justice and peace for all peoples and creatures, as did the first bishop of Chiapas, our brother Friar Bartolomé de Las Casas, through peaceful evangelization, and later followed in his footsteps by Friar Pedro Lorenzo de la Nada in the lands of the Pochutlas and the Lacandones, as can be seen in the mural that is about to be unveiled.

    The cultural event that brings us together today is a movement in three moments: image, word and music.

    The image

    Through murals, the Mayan peoples have long preserved their ancestral memory, the culmination of which are the murals of Bonampak. This tradition is renewed in contemporary Mayan art, such as that of the great master Antún Kojtom, a Tseltal artist from Tenejapa, who accepted the invitation of the Dominican friars to conceive, design, and paint the mural that will be unveiled in a few moments by the Provincial Prior of the Dominicans in Mexico, Friar Luis Javier Rubio Guerrero, the guest artist Antún Kojtom, and a friar representing the authorities of the San Lorenzo Mártir church.

    Next, nine paintings by young people from Zinacantán who participated in the introductory acrylic painting workshop offered by Master Antún last week will be exhibited. Their works reflect the ch'ulel, or spiritual strength, that accompanies them in their inner lives. We will then present them with certificates of recognition for their commitment.

    The word

    Since ancient times, human words have been a reflection of the divine word, especially poetry. In the second part of this cultural event, we will hear poetry from Xun Betan, a Tsotsil writer from Venustiano Carranza, and from the young people who participated in the workshop he led for several weeks in Zinacantán. We will also present certificates of recognition for their commitment.

    The music

    And to conclude, traditional music, that ancestral sound memory, will inspire us to look closely at the monumental mural by the master Antún Kojtom and the acrylics of his students. The sound waves of the traditional musicians from the Parish of San Lorenzo Mártir de Sots'leb will reach throughout the plaza, echoing in the sacred hills inhabited by the ch'ulelal, who also watch over us and accompany us today.

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    We, the Dominican friars, offer this gift to the people of Zinacanteco. It was made possible thanks to the agreement of the three community authorities: the municipality, the churches, and the pastoral plan.

    A special word of gratitude to the Sertull Foundation of Mexico City for its generous support in funding this initiative, as well as to the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center for its support in educating about historical memory and the human rights of indigenous peoples.

    In conclusion, I invite the Dominican family (friars, sisters, and laity) to continue deepening, with rigor and hope, the historical memory of that complex past of the Dominicans in Chiapas, considering the challenges that lie ahead in our time:

    • to make visible the stories of women knowledgeable in ancestral Mayan spirituality and their current positions in the communities, as well as the people of the

    sexual diversity in its dignity, its rights and its community responsibility;

    • and to accompany children and young people in their processes as they passionately embrace technological modernity, with its opportunities and its serious risks of ecological, social and political devastation, in times of algorithms and artificial intelligence.

    May the contemporary Tsotsil and Tseltal art that we will contemplate in the mural and the acrylics, hear in the poems and celebrate with the traditional music allow us to celebrate the dialogue of knowledge between the peoples, with their diverse ancestral and contemporary spiritualities.

    May we continue to practice mutual listening in our times to promote the full life of the native peoples of the Highlands of Chiapas, especially the Zinacantec people.

    Welcome to this celebration of life for the people of Zinacanteco, past and present!

    Sots'leb, June 6, 2026

    Friar Carlos Mendoza Álvarez, OP

    Coordinator of cultural activities 500 OP Chiapas

  • JobeLab Una iniciativa de pensamiento crítico y espiritualidades diversas desde San Cristóbal de Las CasasJobeLab | San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas | 2026

    JobeLab An initiative of critical thinking and diverse spiritualities from San Cristóbal de Las Casas

    By Carlos Mendoza Álvarez

    From the second half of the 20th century, Chiapas became a laboratory of new ways of inhabiting and thinking about the world, with the creative confluence of important social, political, cultural and spiritual processes.

    Among them, dynamism stands out synodal (or shared path by all the believing people with their diversity of ministries) of six decades, implemented by the Diocese of San Cristóbal de Las Casas with jTatik Samuel Ruiz as pastor walker And hundreds of local, regional, and international communities and groups, convened for justice and peace for the Indigenous peoples and other communities of this region of Chiapas. In an astonishing confluence of paths, the Indigenous Congress of 1974 marked the beginning of the public presence of Indigenous peoples with their own voice. Indigenous, mestizo, and international social and cultural movements also emerged, with research projects on the rich Mayan heritage, both ancient and modern, developed by teams of social anthropologists, archaeologists, and linguisticists. Waves of researchers arrived from Latin America, the United States, and Europe, and, with an academic model still largely based on extractive practices, made significant discoveries in the social sciences and humanities. The translation of the Bible into Mayan languages, initially promoted by the Summer School of Bible as part of a U.S. interventionist plan, evolved into intercultural dialogue, continued to this day by various Christian churches, including the Roman Catholic Church. Finally, the Zapatista movement, with its armed and media-driven uprising of 1994, became the watershed moment of a social, political, and cultural insurrection that continues to this day as one of the most radical critiques of the hegemonic system of the multi-headed capitalist hydra, including patriarchy and colonialism.

    ∂

    The “San Cristóbal School” is a name proposed decades ago by Pablo Romo and others in academia and the arts to evoke the legacy of critical thought, resistance, and spirituality that emerged in Chiapas, as a counterpart to the Cuernavaca School, analyzed by Humberto Beck. In their connections and differences, both represent significant contributions to critical thought that arose in Mexico during the last century.

    In this way, recognizing the individuals, groups, organizations, and initiatives of civil society that have been an active part of these processes, as a collective inspired by them, with JobeLab -apocope of Jobel which is the Tsotsil name of San Cristóbal de Las Casas and laboratory To designate this city as a laboratory, we seek to give continuity to such a legacy in a new context, focusing on critical thinking and the spiritualities that have sustained them, such as those of the native peoples, Catholic Christianity, and more recently Buddhism and Islam.

    Through the initiative JobeLab. Ongoing dialogues and mutual support for re-existences We will continue to cultivate this heritage in the new scenario of the civilizational crisis that humanity faces in the second quarter of the 21st century, where peaceful coexistence between nations and the balance of planet Earth are at risk and call us to promote processes of resistance and re-existence.

    We will nurture this initiative based on two inspiring attitudes that are, at the same time, transversal axes of the talks, meetings and festivals that we will organize in various spaces of the city: hospitality and commensality.

    The hospitality It is one of the human gestures that most powerfully expresses our shared human condition, that is, our way of becoming individuals and communities as beings in relation to one another. This radical attitude of openness to otherness is a fundamental ethical and political act, where the religions and spiritualities of humanity celebrate a glimpse of divinity.

    The commensality, Like the other side of the moon, it is the nourishing soil where we receive the otherness of Mother Earth, of other humans who become our neighbors, and of Divinity, through food and drink created by the unique genius of each people. We celebrate this gift as an inclusive banquet where Divine Sophia prepares a table for all nations and creatures of the cosmos.

    Together with Carmen Reyes and Ricardo Hernández, Angélica Evangelista and Abraham Mena, I am enthusiastically participating in this project, drawing on the Dominican tradition of life and thought. In these exchanges, we seek to discover new expressions of the divine and human Word as a creative fire that redeems, animates, and shelters us in our present circumstances. times of hardship as a human species that puts itself and the Common Home at risk, leading us to the precipice of annihilation.

    ∂

    This week two events will be the formal presentation of JobeLab, after the first event where the initiative germinated, on January 28, with a presentation on Gaza and Chiapas at the Charity temple in the city of San Cristóbal de Las Casas.

    On Wednesday, March 25th at 5:30 pm, we will hold the discussion “The School of San Cristóbal,” with the participation of Pablo Romo, who was one of the key figures in the diocesan process of promoting human rights, paving the way for the creation of the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center. Martha Elena Welsh, choreographer who animates in Xitla House In Mexico City, workshops were held to support people in situations of extreme vulnerability, facing various forms of violence. And Juan Carlos La Puente, a Peruvian with extensive international experience in providing spiritual support to human rights defenders, has been developing a methodology for this purpose from his base in Oregon, USA. permanent discernment as a path of body for people and communities in re-existence.

    And then, on Friday, March 27th at 5 p.m., we will explore another facet of re-existence: forgiveness as a path to reconciliation in contexts of violence. With the Muslim community of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, represented by Shaykh Yahya Rhodus and Shaykh Mudar Abudlghani, we will discuss forgiveness in Christian and Muslim traditions as a common path to peace, at a critical moment of violence in the Middle East. And we will do so accompanied by the extraordinary music and song of Nader Khan, a Canadian Sufi artist.

    We invite you to be a part of JobeLab From wherever we may be, whether attending talks and meetings, or imagining and creating similar spaces where we can come together and flourish as individuals and communities in resistance and re-existence, going beyond the spiral of violence that surrounds us, towards a world another world of hospitality and commensality.

    Jobel, March 23, 2026

  • Los Cristos negros de ZinacantánCarlos Mendoza Álvarez | Black Christ | Elambó Esquipulas, Chiapas | 2026

    The Black Christs of Zinacantán

    By Carlos Mendoza Álvarez

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    The patron saint festival of Elambó Esquipulas in the Highlands of Chiapas opens with the resounding music of a band whose cymbals, clarinet, trumpets, and drum enliven the community's procession. We walk from the entrance of the village to the chapel of the Black Christ, draped in a pink mantle embroidered with colorful flowers and adorned with a curly wig of jet-black hair. The darkness of his skin stands out even more against the flowery backdrop and reflects, with a few glimmers in his arms outstretched on the cross, the candles. sown on the floor, burning amidst the incense that fills the altar.

    Once the initial greeting is given, the community kneels to pray the invocation of mercy in the Tsotsil language, under the guidance of Mariano, the catechist in charge, all imploring God for forgiveness for the world, in a murmur that begins like raging waves and then becomes a whisper and caress, like waves brushing against the sand of the beach, a sign of a pacified communal conscience.

    The Mass continues with biblical readings in Tsotsil focusing on the cross of Galilee, followed by a brief meditation that I lead for the community in Spanish. I summarize three key thoughts for the catechist-interpreter to develop with endless eloquence. I center on the biblical meaning of Jesus' cross as a result of his commitment to the excluded of his time. Then, I briefly recount the story of the Lord of Esquipulas in Guatemala, quoting my brother. jTotik Alfonso, though adding my own commentary, points out that its black color symbolizes the sufferings of the people that Christ bears. I see the image adorned with flowers and realize that the Crucified One offers us a loving embrace in the last breath of his life. It comes spontaneously to me to say this to the community, who listen attentively, and I see them receive that embrace with grateful expressions. And I conclude by inviting us all to celebrate the Lord of Esquipulas with our own commitment of love, caring, as he did in life, for those who suffer most in the community, beginning with children whose health is threatened by the soft drink and junk food industries, young people drawn to money, drugs, and alcohol, and women who suffer violence in their own homes and communities.

    The consecration of the bread and wine is experienced with profound devotion by the kneeling community. But this sacred moment of adoration of the body and blood of Jesus, the anointed of God, suddenly becomes an even deeper reverence thanks to the traditional song and dance of the Bolom Chon o jaguar song which expresses the deepest soul of the Tsotsil, Tseltal, and Tojolabal peoples, the Mayan peoples of the Chiapas Highlands. Traditional musicians play the harp, violin, and guitar with a slow, measured rhythm, like a mantra growing in a sonic spiral of infinite tenderness, lulling the incarnate God and Mother Earth, whom our feet touch with their dance. For it is worth remembering that, for the Mayan peoples, in the rites of ancestral tradition—such as those of the Tseltal people studied by the Jesuit— Eugenio Maurer In Bachajón, the dance has a religious meaning, because with the feet one caresses Mother Earth, the primordial gift of the Giver of Life.

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    ∂

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    The Christ of Esquipulas, which originated in Guatemala, is a powerful representation of the diverse faces of faith of the ancient Mayan peoples, celebrating Tezcatlipoca under Mexica influence, according to the Dominican chronicler. Friar Diego Durán, to ask for rain:

    […] it was made of a very shiny and jet-black stone [obsidian], the stone from which they make razors and knives for cutting. In the other cities it was made of wood carved in the figure of a man, all black from the temples down, with a white forehead, nose, and mouth, the color of an Indian, dressed in some fine attire in his Indian style. First, he had gold ear ornaments and others of silver. On his lower lip, he had a lip plug of crystalline beryl in which was inserted a green feather, and sometimes a blue one, which from the outside looked like an emerald or ruby. This lip plug was about a gem long, above a ponytail of hair that he had on his head (Durán, II, 1995: 47).

    Centuries later, in that image, the Christianized Mayan people venerate the Nazarene with new meanings. In every corner of Zinacantán I visited this week, I found new and astonishing alterations to the image and the meanings the community gives it. From the story of a charred black Christ who miraculously survived a fire to the icon that darkens because it absorbs the sins of the world, we encounter stories that recount the anxieties and longings of its faithful devotees, giving the Christ increasingly intense shades according to the skin color or the consciousness of the community that venerates him.

    Two scenes remain in my memory from these days exploring the Zinacanteco landscapes. Both hark back to the ancestral rites of the Tsotsil people.

    The first is the prayer of forgiveness when the entire community, in a collective surge, with cries, tears, and sighs, raises its prayer kneeling on the sedge –These are the pine needles laid like a green and fragrant carpet on the floor of the hermitage, chapel, or temple, supporting the feet of the community gathered amidst candles—the incense mingled with the scent of pine from the surrounding forests. A vestige of the people of the mist and the forest, as the poet from Tuxtla sings. Juan Bañuelos:

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    Dawn breaks. The humidity is like sleep: motionless. Only
    ascends
    a people with roots in the throats of birds
    whose song stirs the fragrant carpet of the rushes
    The smoke from the huts rises, mimicking Mayan fretwork patterns.
    while the cyclical serum of memory is filtered out

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    The second scene that lingers in my heart is the ritual dance of sonic and rhythmic adoration that moves the assembled community, caressing the earth that has borne fruit to the son of Mary, perhaps a jaguar Christ, according to the memory of the Mayan peoples. Bodies transfigured by a radiance of ancestral humanity that opens itself to the loving mystery.

    The Black Christs of Zinacantán continue to luminize in every place, with darker or lighter tones, depending on the land that welcomes and venerates them. Black Christ of Esquipulas during the time of the Captaincy General of Guatemala. Black Christ of Tila during the time of Chiapas' independence. Black Christ of Zinacantán during the time of the indigenous uprising. Black Christ of today's communities facing the mirage of prosperity from the flower and textile trade. Black Christs that will come in the troubled times we live in.

    What laments and what praises will future generations of the Tsotsil people sing when, half a century from now, the cry of wounded humanity makes the Black Christ even darker?

    What laments, praises, and dances do we experience when we realize that time is running out to seek and find solace for a humanity threatened with death by the world of the powerful?

    The black Christs of Zinacantán are a great paradox: an embrace of suffering and a promise of life.

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    Ts'ajal Nam, January 17, 2026

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    Note: I would like to read your comments in the final section of this page.

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