The Catholic Church in Mexico urged society to value and recognize the country’s indigenous communities beyond “folklore”, warning that without them, “the world loses a pillar of their identity.”
In the most recent publishing house of His weekly from faiththe primacy archdiocese of Mexico said that native peoples are often “marginalized and stripped.” However, he recalled that in spite of everything, “they have resisted dignity despite the misunderstanding and exclusion, the abuse of powerful who have considered their values, their cultures and traditions inferior.”
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The text emphasizes that in a world that advances at high speed, where cultures tend to “homogenize and memory is diluted, indigenous peoples question us with a silent but firm force.”
“They guard languages, rites, symbols and knowledge that are the result of centuries of harmonious relationship between communities. Their way of understanding life is not a vestige of the past: it is a source of wisdom for the present and a compass for the future,” adds the editorial.
According to the latest data of the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI) of 2020, in Mexico there were 23.2 million people three years or more who identified themselves as indigenous, equivalent to 19% of the population in that age range.
For its part, the National Institute of Indigenous Languages (INALI) reports that in the country 68 languages are spoken. Mexico is the nation with the greatest indigenous population in America, after Guatemala and Bolivia.
That your “voice has weight in decisions”
The archdiocese of Mexico pointed out that recognizing the value of indigenous peoples “implies much more than admiring their folklore or preserving their crafts. It means opening a real space for their voice to have weight in the decisions that affect their territories, their environment and their way of living.”
In times of environmental and social crisis, he warned that these communities “are not a footnote in history books”, and they must be an example “of a way of living that can help us recover harmony with creation and heal deep injuries.” “Listening to them is not a courtesy gesture; it is an act of justice and responsibility towards the common future,” he added.
The Church recalled that, in 2016, during Pope Francis’s visit to Mexico, he expressed in Chiapas the desire of peoples for a world where fraternity, solidarity and peace over the devaluation, injustice and violence prevail.
On that occasion, the pontiff regretted: “What sadness! What good would do us all to do an examination of conscience and learn to say: Forgiveness! Forgiveness, brothers! The world of today, stripped by the culture of discard, needs them.”
In that sense, the archdiocese of Mexico joined the call of Pope Francis, stating that “progress cannot be measured only in economic figures, but in the ability to live in balance and in peace with what surrounds us.”
He urged to value the native peoples, because “it is to recognize that human history is plural, that its beauty is in their diversity. It is to assume that without them and without their community contribution, the world loses a pillar of their identity.”
Diego López Colín
I am a graduate of journalism at the Carlos Septién García school with experience of religious institutional communication. Since 2016 I write for digital media and, since 2018, I report the most important news about the Catholic event in Mexico for the Ewtn news channel. ACI Press correspondent in Mexico since 2023.