Bernardo Abeyta, Founder of the Santuario de Chimayó

Santuario de Chimayó, by William H. Wroth, posted by the New Mexico Office of the State Historian:

http://www.newmexicohistory.org/filedetails.php?fileID=505

By 1805 if not earlier, devotion to a miraculous Guatemalan image of Christ crucified known as Our Lord of Esquipulas (Nuestro Señor de Esquipulas) had become popular at El Potrero. In that year a child was christened with the name Juan de Esquipulas by Fray Sebastián Alvarez, the resident Franciscan friar at Santa Cruz de la Cañada.

In 1813 Bernardo Abeyta (uncle of the child so christened) petitioned in the name of the residents of El Potrero to the same Fray Sebastián for permission to build a chapel dedicated to Our Lord of Esquipulas, who had already been honored since 1810 in a small chapel of the Abeyta family. Fray Sebastián wrote in support of Abeyta’s petition in 1813 that people had been coming to Abeyta’s chapel for some time to “give praise to the sovereign Redeemer” and “to relieve their ailments.” He also stated the location and name of the new chapel “at the said plaza or Rancho del Potrero, which is called El Santuario de Esquipulas.”

By 1816 the Potrero chapel was completed and its elegant carved door, still to be seen today, was made by carpenter Pedro Domíngez at the expense of Fray José Corea, the resident friar at Santa Cruz, who had succeeded Alvarez.

Devotion to Our Lord of Esquipulas originated at an early colonial shrine in Guatemala where the earth itself was said to be effective in curing illnesses. This miraculous statue of Christ is attached to a “living” cross, painted green and sprouting leaves and branches, symbolic of its healing and life-giving qualities. At both the shrine in Guatemala and at El Santuario pilgrims come from distant places to be healed, and there has been much speculation concerning the way in which the devotion to the miraculous image and the healing earth of such an apparently remote shrine in Guatamala came to be transplanted to New Mexico.

Some have suggested that Abeyta or perhaps a friar must have traveled to Guatemala. However, the devotion to Our Lord of Esquipulas, although originating in Guatemala, was by 1800 already widespread throughout central Mexico and was found also in the north, ranging as far as northern Sonora. So there is no reason to posit a direct introduction to New Mexico from Guatemala, leapfrogging Mexico.

It appears that devotion to this dark-complected image of Christ crucified was spread through Mexico primarily by Franciscan friars. In the 1690s friars from the Convento de la Santa Cruz in Querétaro, Mexico, led by Antonio Margil de Jesús and Melchor López de Jesús, were sent to Guatemala and in 1694 founded the Hospice of the Calvary.

In the year 1704 Margil de Jesús founded the Colegio de Cristo Crucificado in the city of Santiago de Guatemala (now known as Antigua) and spent several years traveling all over the country before returning to Querétaro and later founding the Colegio de Guadalupe in Zacatecas. Without doubt Margil de Jesús and his fellow Franciscans were perfectly familiar with this miraculous image of Our Lord of Esquipulas, who by 1704 was already one of the patron protectors of the city of Santiago de Guatemala.

It is likely that Margil de Jesús and his friars brought this devotion back to Querétaro, and the many shrines and altars to Our Lord of Esquipulas in Nueva Galicia (the present states of Jalisco and Michoacán) owe their origin to Franciscan friars of the eighteenth century. This devotion did not exist in northern Mexico in the early 1700s, before Margil and his friars returned from Guatemala.

Later during the 1700s the devotion was found in many of the Jaliscan communities under Franciscan auspices and apparently had been established by the resident friars. Among the towns in Jalisco where the devotion to Our Lord of Esquipulas is found are Zapotlan (Ciudad Guzmán), Tuxpan, Cocula, Tenamaxtlán, and Juchitlán, as well as in the city of Colima, just south of Jalisco.

Thus it is quite possible that Fray Sebastián Alvarez or some other Franciscan could have introduced the devotion to Our Lord of Esquipulas to the Chimayó area of New Mexico where it was avidly embraced by Bernardo Abeyta. As Borhegyi notes: “The correct spelling of the name Esquipulas as we find it in Don Bernardo's letter and in the parish records, as well as the proper iconographical style of the crucifix in the Santuario of Chimayó, indicates that someone must have had first-hand knowledge of the original image and cult in Guatemala.”

That someone with accurate knowledge could have been a Franciscan friar, or it could have been Don Bernardo Abeyta himself, and he could well have visited one of the many shrines to Our Lord of Esquipulas in central and northern Mexico, seen the sagrada copia of the miraculous image and brought home devotional booklets giving the history, feast day and other information concerning this devotion.

The original miraculous statue of Our Lord of Esquipulas was popular with the Indians in Guatemala, in part because of the dark complexion of the face of Christ, and it is not surprising that the image at El Santuario was also popular with Pueblo Indians in New Mexico. The site of Santuario was said by the Tewas to have originally been a hot springs which eventually dried up leaving the healing earth. This healing earth had long been known and used by the Tewas prior to the Spanish occupation of the Santa Cruz valley.

The name Chimayó derives from the Tewa words Tsi Mayoh, meaning “Hill of the East.” This hill rises just above Chimayó and is a prominent landmark seen from all directions. According to Alfonso Ortiz, it was one of the four sacred hills in the Tewa cosmology.

In historic times both Indians and Hispanos have traditionally been pilgrims to El Santuario, and they have parallel stories concerning the miraculous origin of the statue of Our Lord of Esquipulas. Like many similar images of superhuman origin in Mexico and in Spain, the statue was said to have been miraculously discovered by some one at the future site of the El Santuario (Bernardo Abeyta is the discoverer in some local Hispano versions) and taken to Santa Cruz (or to Santa Fe) to the priest, but it inexplicably returned to El Potrero. After this happened several times, it was clear that Our Lord wanted to stay at this place, and therefore the church was built.

Bernardo Abeyta died in 1856 and was buried with ecclesiastical permission in El Santuario.

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From the Hispanic Genealogical Research Center of New Mexico's Great New Mexico Pedigree Database:

http://www.hgrc-nm.org/surnames/GNMPD.html/d0001/g0000187.html#I36177

Bernardo de la Encarnacion ABEYTA [23328]

• BEF 1 JAN 1771 - ____
• BIRTH: BEF 1 JAN 1771, Santa Cruz de la Cañada, New Mexico
• BAPTISM: 1 JAN 1771, Santa Cruz de la Cañada, New Mexico [23329]
• BURIAL: 21 NOV 1856, Potrero, Chapel of our Lord of Esquipulas, New Mexico
• DEATH: Y
• Father: Juan Jose ABEYTA
• Mother: Ana Maria Antonia OLIVAS

Family 1 : Maria Manuela TRUJILLO

• MARRIAGE: 4 DEC 1805, Santa Cruz de la Cañada, New Mexico
  • 1. +Jose Martin ABEYTA
  • 2. Maria de los Dolores ABEYTA
  • 3. Maria Antonia ABEYTA
  • 4. Tomas de Jesus de Esquipulas ABEYTA
  • 5. Maria de Jesus ABEYTA
  • 6. Jose Tomas ABEYTA
  • 7. Antonio Hemeregildo Jesus ABEYTA
  • 8. Maria Manuela ABEYTA
  • 9. +Maria del Carmen ABEYTA

Family 2 : Rita VALERIO

• MARRIAGE: 11 MAY 1797, Santa Cruz de la Cañada, New Mexico [141349]
  • 1. +Maria Francisca ABEYTA
  • 2. +Juan Nepomuceno ABEYTA

Footnote:

• [23328] On November 15, 1813, he sought permission to build the now famous chapel at Chimayó
• [23329] Baptism Padrinos: Francisco Garcia Y Luisa Gomez del Castillo.
• [141349] Padrinos: Juan del Carmen Oliva y Maria de la Luz Vigil, his wife.

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Bernardo Beyta, "New Mexico, Marriages, 1751-1918"

• groom's name: Bernardo Beyta
• bride's name: Trugillo
• marriage date: 02 Mar 1806
• marriage place: Holy Cross, Santa Cruz, Santa Fe, New Mexico
• bride's father's name: Juan Ignacio Trugillo
• groom's marital status: Widowed
• indexing project (batch) number: M51279-3
• system origin: New Mexico-EASy
• source film number: 16972

"New Mexico, Marriages, 1751-1918," index, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/FDP7-GDS : accessed 23 Feb 2013), Bernardo Beyta and Trugillo, 02 Mar 1806; citing reference , FHL microfilm 16972.

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From New Mexico Prenuptial Investigations from the Archivos Historicos del Arzobispado de Durango, 1800-1893, ed. Rick Hendricks, comp. John B. Colligan (Rio Grande Historical Collections, New Mexico State University Library, 2000), Pg. 47:

http://lib.nmsu.edu/depts/archives/documents/ahadnmpi2.pdf

Bernardo Abeytia and Maria Manuela Trujillo, Santa Cruz de la Canada, 23 Sept. - 4 Dec. 1805, AHAD-361, f. 600-607, inc.

Bernardo Abeytia, 35, espanol, a citizen of Santa Cruz, was the legitimate son of Juan Jose Abeytia and the late Ana Maria Oliva. Maria Manuela Trujillo, 18, espanola, was the legitimate daughter of Juan Ignacio Trujillo and the late Josefa Chacon. Bernardo signed his statement. The couple was related in the fourth degree of affinity. Bernardo stated that he had sex with his intended.

Witnesses:

• Julian Quintana, 50
• Jose Guadalupe Martin, 40
• Francisco Montoya, 50
• Tomas Mestas, 38

On 24 Sept. 1805, Father Castro forwarded the proceedings to Durango. On 4 Dec., Visitor General Millan Rodriguez, acting for Bishop Olivares y Benito, noted that it was odd that no statement indicating that the couple was Christian had been included. Parental permission was also lacking. Given the distance from Durango to New Mexico, a dispensation was granted on the condition that the priest rectify the omissions in the proceedings and send the additional information to the bishop. Then, he was to proclaim the banns three times. Assuming no new impediments arose, he was to marry the couple and grant them the nuptial blessing.

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Additional background on Don Bernardo Abeyta and the Santuario is available at the Santuario's webpage:

http://www.holychimayo.us/Santuario/windex.html