The Indigenous Eyes of Murietta

In the conquered desert lands of California, there was an old Mission. A clay-colored building with a large bell dangling from inside of its proud tower. The bell stood silent, with hardly a stir to be heard beyond the howling of the wind and the scattering of the sand. In the distance, the frosted peaks of Mount Shasta were abundantly clear to anyone in search of beauty.

A friar sat quietly in his study, studying his bible, searching for answers to questions that most heavily challenged his beliefs. With every passing year, the Friar's faith waned into a smoldering flicker, yet here he remained in his post, in a building where countless indigenous were made to learn the customs and the beliefs of an empire that had wiped out their proud heritage. The concept of this was something so foreign to him when he started here in these halls all those years ago. But as he grew older and the thrusts of compassion forced him to glimpse deeper into those long-held beliefs he once unquestionably answered to, he saw that what he had done to others was something to which no reasonably good man could stay entitled.

A lone rider on a lethargic horse rode in from the sunrise on the horizon, his sickly posture and heavy breaths unveiling the silhouette of a broken soul, a soul whose life had been thoroughly drawn out, as could be gleaned from his half-glazed, mestizo eyes. Beads of sweat poured from his forehead, drenching him from the brim of his sombrero to the frills of his poncho. The rider, upon closer proximity, was readily identifiable as a young Mexican man in his early twenties with thick brows and a handsome, but sullen face.

As the young Mexican finally arrived at the gates of the mission, he banged on it with the little sums of energy that his body could manage to muster. Slowly yet persistently he knocked. His lips chapped to an unearthly degree, a few words of despair escaped softly through his teeth.

“Someone, please. Let me in.”

The Friar emerged from his study and out into the gate. The young man collapsed into the arms of the man in the cacao-tinted frock.

"What is it that's wrong with you, my boy?" the Friar asked.

"Padre, they are coming for me. I am dying, and there's nowhere left for me to go," the young man replied through elongated gasps.

"You are thirsty. You look as though you haven't had a proper meal in a very long time. Come, boy. Let me take you down this hall." The Friar began pulling the young rider towards the mess halls of the mission. The rider pulled away and sat on a bench near a fountain.

"No, Padre. It is too late for me. All I ask is that you wash away my sins."

The Friar shrugged, realizing how grave the young man's situation was and fully understanding that he was probably right. "Well then, what is it you wish to confess?"

"I killed many, many men in my young adult life. But you must believe me. I didn't do it because I have an insatiable bloodlust. I didn't do it for money or glory or any of those deplorable things. I did it for my people. For my people were driven from their land before by the gringo race. They drove me from the proud homes where my family has stood for generations. They executed my family brutally and with no sign of remorse. On top of our sacred graves, they have built monuments to their twisted values: brothels and saloons, oil rigs and gambling houses. If you had only seen the injustices I saw. I used to be a good little boy if you could believe it. A sweet child who loved everyone and everything. Never once in my life did I intend to be a violent man, but the circumstance bestowed upon me by the white man saw to it otherwise."

"If you have killed the gringos, then my boy, you have greater things to fear than the lakes of damnation."

"I know that very well. I have just barely escaped the clutches of war. War, padre. War! Three thousand of us brave Mexican men versus five hundred of their cowards with cannons and machine guns. We fought hard and well, but ultimately, we were nothing against their technology. I have failed in my mission, and I ask now, as I lay in this mission, if I can be forgiven."

"You are asking the wrong man, Joaquin."

"You know of me?"

"Of course I do. The whole world knows of you. And they will continue to know your name. Long after you and I and everyone we know has perished. You have done many great things. Worthwhile things. You stood for something that mattered, and you saw it to the end. I could never have done the same."

"What do you mean by that, Padre?"

"It is me who should ask you for forgiveness. As the gringo comes in search of you, I lament that it was the ways of my people which opened the floodgates to your people's suffering. Centuries have passed since our Spanish ships first settled onto these lands, and yet I cower at the scale that this suffering, which started by our hand, has only grown. You have no forgiveness to ask for. Certainly not from me. Certainly not from us."

Murietta seemed heartbroken by this assertion. In his final breaths, he felt as though the last thing he needed was a confirmation that all the Saintliness he aspired to was built on a foundation of oppression and betrayal. The Friar, seeming to notice the negative impression he had made, decided that the only good he had left to do in this sickly world was to grant this young hero one final bit of comfort.

"All is forgiven. In the name of the father–" he uttered along with all the rest that goes with it. With a slight smile, Murietta perished into the Friar's arms.

Days later, an army of Americans arrived to collect his body. The Friar read in the paper that his body was decapitated and left on display for all to gawk at, to laugh at. See here what happens to those who stand up for their beliefs. The Friar took this all to be a sign from God, but what He intended to say, the Friar couldn't say.