Category: Youth

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
June 6, 2026
Carlos Mendoza Álvarez | Chapel of the Rosary, Santo Domingo Church of Puebla | 2026

The fruits of Easter

By Carlos Mendoza Álvarez

Three weeks of silence on this blog have passed amidst a whirlwind of pastoral and personal events that, in retrospect, I see as related fruits of this year's Easter journey. Through brief stories, I will try to recount the glimpses of the world to come that I perceived during these days.

The religious celebrations of Holy Week suddenly intertwined with a mysterious encounter at the water wells of Yalentay, in the hills of Zinacantán, where I was unexpectedly welcomed by the guardian of the place. These multifaceted religious celebrations unfolded amidst visits from dear colleagues and friends who had traveled from afar—Amirah and Alicia with Adriana—with whom I longed to share the rich fruits of an indigenous Church rooted in and embodied by the Tsotsil people, accompanied by questions about what still needs to be learned about caring for the land as part of the path of resistance.

Easter in Jobel

The group of six acolytes was entrusted to me for their training and the preparation of their vestments in the Dominican style. They are six teenagers. pigtails who, with great conviction and emotion, wish to dedicate part of their human and spiritual lives, occupying their free time during middle and high school, to “serving at the altar.” In the context of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, a city of intense religious and devotional practice, connecting with young people to serve Christ at the altar and in the community, especially the poor and the excluded, presents a significant pastoral challenge. Integrating a new generation of young believers faces various forms of resistance from older generations, who seem unwavering in their hierarchical and individualistic religious practices of San Cristóbal's popular piety.

But after two months of Saturday meetings in a fraternal atmosphere, with simple prayer from the heart and through listening to biblical stories in contemporary audiovisual versions, an incipient community of friendship with Jesus, as shepherd and friend of the sheep of this and other flocks, was formed.

At the end of this process, which had some tensions with the older generation, I realize the good heart of today's young ponytail holders, eager to serve with beauty and truth at the liturgical altar, while also anxious to translate the symbolism of the altar of Christ—the poor—into acts of service to the most vulnerable in the city.

65 soles

And April arrived with its birthday-like emotional force, giving me the opportunity to relive the feast of desire in my own flesh—with mass and a table set with the hallmark of the flavors and style of Puebla—, accompanied by my family and by old and new friends, as thanksgiving for the 65 springs I have been able to live as a man and as a Dominican, most of my life.

The Chapel of the Rosary, the epicenter of the spiritual life of many families in Puebla, including my own, was the perfect place to offer a prayer of thanksgiving for the gift of life, accompanied by my family and friends throughout so many years of sharing bread and salt, pain and hope, celebration and the work of building other worlds here and now. The Baroque music performed by Julio Saldaña and Suzy Torres, with Magda as soprano and Abraham on keyboard, allowed us to connect with the ancestors of my family and my religious order. This extraordinary space of Baroque art is even more admirable because it tells the stories of women of faith, like Mary, the young woman from Palestine who said yes to the angel, and of many women from the Bible and Dominican sisters from Europe and America, all of them walking, accompanied by the three theological virtues, toward fullness of grace.

It was a pleasure to host my classmates from the State Normal Institute and the Emiliano Zapata Popular Preparatory School as guests. The years that flew by now seem to bring us closer than we are apart. I had the feeling that we were coming home, after each of us had followed our own path, whether as a lawyer, chemist, engineer, educator, or guerrilla fighter.

And to my surprise, meeting Polo Sánchez Brito, scout guide of the Antelopes patrol of Group 1 of Puebla, more than half a century later, was to reaffirm those lessons to be self-reliant and in community in the middle of the forest, orienting oneself with the compass and the stars on the initiation walks, learning to light a fire with flint and a little straw, to cook breakfast and prepare coffee with milk at dawn, in addition to recognizing the footprints of the animals that passed by on the paths and recording them in plaster molds.

Six toasts, one for each decade lived, allowed me to recall small stories of family childhood and as a boy scout, the affective awakening of adolescence, the critical high school youth, the profession chosen from an early age in my case as a Dominican, the faith committed throughout the years according to a spiritual and intellectual tradition of eight centuries, and finally the academic life of three decades inspired by the pastoral accompaniment to vulnerable communities in Mexico.

And in the end, all this shared memory was crowned by the loving toast in the voices of my sister María Eugenia, my friend Raúl from high school and Amirah, who represented the doctoral students of Boston College from various countries of Our America, from whom I continue to learn so much.

What a joy to celebrate the gift of life in this way!

Bavarian dialogues

And, as a challenging continuation of life, I am now undertaking a brief academic stay in Eichstätt, in Bavaria, thanks to the invitation of my friend, Professor Martin Kirschner, who is allowing me to reconnect with that profession of teaching that I left a year ago when I resigned from Boston College, after three decades of academic life.

Being the “subject of study” for doctoral students in Bavaria wasn't entirely unfamiliar to me, after Cleusa Caldeira, at the Jesuit Faculty of Theology in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, dedicated her doctoral thesis to exploring my contribution to theological thought. Here, Constantin was tasked with reading my latest book on the resurrection as messianic anticipation, in order to pose incisive questions about the “reality” of Jesus' resurrection, asking what happened to his body and how it affects us today. At its core, there was a metaphysical questioning underlying this foundational event of Christian existence.

Returning to the rhythm of a European university city—calm, quiet, and orderly in its timing and customs—is a delight. But it's also a challenge not to disconnect from the life and pastoral processes I've been immersed in for the past five months in Chiapas.

In what way, going forward, will you be able to achieve a balance between action and thought, with enough time for meditation, reflection, and writing?

The dream of a cabin-home appears on the horizon, a place to socialize with friends in body and spirit, the breath of the divine Ruah to let us be moved by its breeze.

Perhaps the volcanic environment of my childhood is the fertile humus that will make that dream bloom.

Eichstätt, April 30, 2026

April 30, 2026
David Alfaro Siqueiros | Portrait of Saint Dominic | CUC, 1970

Dominicans on the frontiers In blessed memory of Friar Daniel Ulloa Herrero OP (+), 1946-2026

By Carlos Mendoza Álvarez

Hospitality and commensality are two vital attitudes that, over the years, I have cultivated with the Dominicans since my first encounter in 1979 with Daniel Ulloa and Raúl Vera, then formators of postulants and novices respectively, on the path of initiation to charism of preaching, which has been in dialogue with diverse cultures for eight centuries, with the chiaroscuro of every century-old institution, its shadows and its great lights.

Even during my childhood in Puebla, both virtues were present in the life of the family, around the figure of my maternal grandmother, my great-aunt, my mother and aunts, along with the uncles who made each family meeting a true celebration of flavors and dances.

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Daniel Ulloa Herrero passed away a few days ago in Cuernavaca, and today the ashes of his mortal body will be deposited in the Columbarium of the Temple of Santa María de la Anunciación, known as the University Parish, next to the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Copilco, which was founded by the Dominicans in 1963, with the spirit of the ongoing conciliar renewal, to cultivate dialogue with intellectuals, students, athletes and workers of the country's top university.

Friar Daniel received priestly ordination there, along with Friar Miguel Concha and Friar Antonio Ramos, on July 25, 1970, from Bishop Don Sergio Méndez Arceo, who was a council father and an eminent witness of the liberating Latin American Church, against the current of the prominent groups of the Catholic hierarchy and conservative lay people of the time.

The CUC - as the University Cultural Center Founded by the Dominicans, the university was famous in its golden age for its University Mass and its Film Club, which showcased the latest art films by unknown and even banned directors such as Pasolini, Tarkovsky, Kurosawa, Fellini, and Buñuel. The presence of the Dominicans in every faculty of the UNAM—whether as professors, students, or guest lecturers—extended beyond the university campus, fostering dialogue between faith and reason with students and professors alike.

In that impetus, Daniel Ulloa, Raúl Vera, and Miguel Concha were trained as preaching friars by figures of the stature of Friar Alberto Escurdia, professor at the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters; Friar Agustín Desobry, who arrived from France with a great project for a cultural center as a space to promote dialogue with university students; Friar Jaime Gurza, an exquisite and cultured man, knowledgeable about the mystical and aesthetic tradition of the medieval and modern Dominicans; and Friar Julián Pablo Fernández, filmmaker and painter, friend of Don Luis Buñuel, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Juan Rulfo, Octavio Paz, Guillermina Bravo, and so many other creators of Mexican culture of the time.

Daniel Ulloa stood out for his brilliant intelligence, which he would later cultivate as a historian, graduating from El Colegio de México with a thesis on the conflicting currents of the Dominicans upon their arrival in Tierra Firme in 1526: on the one hand, Friar Domingo de Betanzos, with a rigorous reformist spirit in convent life and doctrine, as part of the evangelization and colonization undertaken by the Spanish Crown; on the other hand, Friar Bartolomé de Las Casas, with a bold emphasis in his criticism of the ongoing coloniality, confronting the Encomienda system through the promotion of the Laws of the Indies and a method of peaceful evangelization that he had already tested for years on the coast of Venezuela and later in Verapaz in Guatemala.

Daniel Ulloa's vibrant personality was marked by a creative sense of humor and exquisite irony that allowed him to connect immediately with young people, both in universities and in working-class neighborhoods. A notable chapter in his history as a young priest was the rock Mass that, along with a band of young people from the alleyway of Leandro Valle, a neighbor of La Lagunilla and Tepito, the "tough" neighborhoods of Mexico City's Historic Center, he enlivened on Sunday nights at the Santo Domingo church.

Later, both of these intense experiences—his intellectual life as a historian and his pastoral accompaniment of young people from diverse urban cultures—allowed Daniel, as prior of the CUC, to propose a renewed vision of university ministry in the 1980s that emphasized the intellectual life and pastoral accompaniment of university students with their multiple identities. During his years as prior, for example, he welcomed Brothers Roberto and Benjamín Cuéllar, from the Christian Legal Aid organization founded by Archbishop Romero, who became our mentors in human rights work. This experience paved the way for the creation of the Fray Francisco de Vitoria OP Human Rights Center, the oldest civil society organization in Mexico among those that now comprise the network. All rights for all.

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The General Chapter of the Order of Preachers, held in Mexico in 1992, where I had the blessing of serving as Secretary General, elected Friar Timothy Radcliffe as Master of the Order. In his first month in office, he convened a remarkable group of friars as his close collaborators: Jean-Jacques Perennès of the Province of France as Assistant for the Apostolic Life, Guido Vergauwen of the Province of Flanders as Assistant for the Intellectual Life, and Daniel Ulloa of the Province of Mexico as Secretary of the Order. Together with other friars of this vigorous caliber—as enlightened preachers with a profound sense of thought and spirituality dedicated to justice, peace, and beauty—Friar Timothy encouraged the entire Dominican family for nine years to reclaim the prophetic spirit of “holy preaching.” This was the name of the work started by Dominic of Guzman, Bishop Diego de Osma, the sisters of Prulla and the layman Peter Ceila in Languedoc, in turbulent times of return to the radicalism of the gospel, which was shared by the mendicant movements of the time.

Years later, Friar Daniel emigrated to the United States to continue his university ministry, first in New York, then in Brooklyn, and later in New Jersey. We Dominicans of Mexico owe him a debt of gratitude: to reclaim his legacy and renew the charism of preaching in these new theological spaces where God encounters wounded humanity seeking life, dignity, beauty, justice, and peace around the common table of divine compassion.

More recently, on December 7, 2024, when Friar Timothy received the cardinalate from Pope Francis, many of his companions from that time gathered in Rome to celebrate this momentous occasion. In a video recorded on that day, Friar Daniel recalled that the main purpose of the gathering was to reaffirm the urgent need for the charism of preaching to proclaim the Good News amidst the turbulent times humanity is experiencing.

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To honor the legacy of that generation of preaching friars who have marked my life as a person, as a Christian, and as a Dominican, my theological work and pastoral service of several decades has sought to listen to each community and culture where I have lived: Mexico City with its disparate and diverse neighborhoods; university students in Fribourg, Switzerland, Paraná in Brazil, Paris, Mexico City, New York, Rio de Janeiro, and Boston; as well as the indigenous peoples of Oaxaca and Chiapas, from decades ago to the present day, to the Lakota and Mapuche peoples at the extreme North and South of the continent.

Inspired by this Dominican spirit, at the confluence of faith and reason, I now participate in the development of this initiative JobeLab In San Cristóbal de Las Casas, along with friends from this city. I'll tell you more soon about this exciting network of friendship, hospitality, and budding culinary experiences.

In the coming days, we will be holding two events here in Jobel: on Wednesday, March 25th at 5:50 pm at Belil Restaurant, a presentation about the San Cristóbal School as a breeding ground for critical thinking that emerged in Chiapas in the second half of the 20th century, with the participation of Pablo Romo, Martha Elena Welsh, and Juan Carlos L. Puente. And on Friday, March 27th, at 5 pm at the Charity Temple, we will host the event “Music for Interreligious Encounter,” together with Shaykh Yahya Rhodus and Shaykh Mudar Abdulghani from the city's Muslim community, focusing on the Sufi music and chants of Nader Khan, a Canadian believer and artist, as expressions of encountering the sacred in times of extreme violence.

We look forward to welcoming you for an experience of hospitality and dining.

Jobel, March 21, 2026

March 21, 2026

English