Uncomfortable observation

Mexico is a child of rape. Inexorably, the old times Gary Jennings wrote about in his masterpiece Aztec are gone. The cultures of Spain and Meso-America, the very blood of the conquered and the conquerors, are united in a guilty bond. Sometimes I look in the mirror and I see the face of the rapists. Sometimes I imagine I see the visage of the raped.

I always wonder:

1) Would there be a place in this connected globe for the One World, the beauty and terrible violence of the old Mexica? If Cortez had left the peoples of Mexico alone, would there be the Ball Game, mass sacrifice, Flower Wars, etc. going on even now?

2) Is it right to extinguish a way of life, even a brutal one, with brutality? Can the forced mixing of Spanish and Native blood be justified by arguing that the Native culture was simply too savage to be allowed to survive?

3) Can the old wound ever be healed?

As I go to church, a Roman Catholic as a result of all of this history, I pray that the result for me is positive. The Spanish gave one gift to Mexico that I believe in my heart is beautiful and that gift is the faith of the Church. Mary is the special guardian of the Mexican people. I love Mary, and I thank God that she looks with favor on her people. Perhaps the modern Mexicans would have been her people anyway, without genocide. The world will never know.