The Power & The Glory - The Whiskey Priest – Return to Life

This book’s main concern is the revelation of God's saving glory and the human response of faith, signifying the turning from darkness to light, from death to life. Throughout the narrative, “glory” is revealed in the person and ministry of an unnamed “whiskey” priest who is hunted by Communist authorities during the religious persecution in Mexico in the early twentieth century. Despite his own sense of worthlessness, (he refers to himself as a bad priest, is a heavy drinker, and has fathered an illegitimate child), he is determined to continue to function as a priest until capture or escape to the North. The priest turns back and forth both physically and spiritually throughout the book, between earthly salvation and eternal salvation.

Earthly salvation in the form of escape to safe lands in the north, and a r

But at the centre of his own faith, there always stood the convincing mystery – that we were made in God’s image. God was the parent, but He was also the policeman, the criminal, the priest, the maniac, and the judge. Something resembling God dangled from the gibbet or went into odd attitudes before the bullets in a prison yard or contorted itself like a camel in the attitude of sex. He would sit in the confessional and hear the complicated dirty ingenuities which God’s image had thought out, and God’s image (here referring to the Judas mestizo) shook now, up and down on the mules back, with yellow teeth sticking out over the lower lip, and God’s image (the priest himself) did its despairing act of rebellion with Maria in the hut among the rats(101).

It is in this terribly hot and dry setting, filed with the poor and wretched, The Whiskey priest continually aches for comfort but turns towards suffering and death: on the one hand, to reach down to what lies within -- the bruised soul that is buried alive with guilt for his drinking and lust sin which created a daughter; on the other hand, to reach out to what lies without -- the suffering that is pushed to the margins of our world. Turning towards salvation and God.

Those of us who live in a context of Western affluence find this perhaps more difficult than others. Access to entertainment and consumerism, medication for the merest hint of pain, institutions and structures which push to the boundaries all that is bruised and disabled, funeral customs that are disembodied and cursory - all these can shield us from the pain of what it means to be human” (Lee 277).

How does good spoil, and how can bad be redeemed? Actually the “good” life formerly lived by the priest did spoil. The drink and the illegitimate child are evidence of that. Then again, the priest never recognizes the good in himself but only what he perceives to be failure as a man and a priest. He has thoughts on the nature of God in every being while first travelling with the Mestizo which bear out his feeling of being a “bad” image of God:

On Jan. 1, 1994, in the high limestone mesas of southern Mexico, masked rebels, called Zapatistas, took over the city hall of San Cristobal de las Casas. The city derives its name from the famous "Protector of the Indians," Bartolome de las Casas (1474-1566), named bishop there in 1544. The rebels -- in large part both "Indian" and poor -- took their name from Emiliano Zapata, who earlier in this century fought for the land rights of Mexico's poor Zapata's 1918 "Manifesto to the Mexican People" called for the Revolution "to redeem the indigenous race, giving it back its lands and thereby its liberty; to convert the laborer in the fields. the present slave of the haciendas, into a man free and in control of his destiny through small property. The reforms of the Revolution, as codified in the Constitution of 1917, were welcomed by the indigenous peasants of Chiapas. Some received ejido lands, which were communally held; others -- indigenous people toiling on ranches -- benefited from the enforcement of articles that abolished debt servitude. The land redistribution was welcome, certainly, but it is clear that most reforms benefited certain strata of indigenous society, tightening relations between the ruling party and local caciques, or strongmen. (Paul Farmer, The Americas Magazine, March 28 1998)

eturn to his clean and happy life as a parish priest with clean clothes, money in his pocket, and the open respect and admiration of his flock. The ability to fulfill his ambitions, serve the people and give them God. “He thought “if I go, I shall meet other priests: I

Some topics in this essay:
Power Glory, Divine Comedy, Politics History, Whiskey Priest’s, Roman Catholicism, Mexican People, Padre Jose, Chiapas Mexican, Gandhi Chiapas, Moises Gandhi, god’s image, whiskey priest, people god, encounter politics history, james cockcroft mexico's, eternal salvation, james cockcroft, earthly salvation, towards god, cockcroft mexico's hope, hand reach, hope encounter politics, reach lies, reach lies --, paul farmer,