For those not acquainted with early twentieth-century Latin American politics, the setting of Graham Greene’s The Power and the Glory can be a shock.
Mexico is redolent of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the sixteenth-century apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Juan Diego, who appeared in clothing consistent with Indigenous symbolism and spoke Nahuatl, Diego’s native tongue. Catholicism flourished in the country, where, despite the Spanish missionaries spearheading its establishment, Our Lady of Guadalupe ensured that, to the native population, it never felt like a foreign imposition.
In the vast colonial empire of “New Spain”, Catholicism was an unrivalled institution, operating hospitals and schools, and standing at the centre of culture and administration. After Napoleon invaded Spain in 1808, the country’s colonial grip weakened, paving the way for an independent Republic of Mexico. But even in this push for autonomy from Catholic Spain, the movement was led by the Church. Mexican priests Miguel Hidalgo and José María Morelos were instrumental in the eventual independence from Spain brought about in 1821. Despite Fr Hidalgo having been executed for his part in the agitation a decade prior, he is recognised as Father of the Nation.
This history, in which the Church thrives and remains an imperative national symbol, makes Greene’s novel, set in a period when Catholicism was outlawed in Mexico, all the more surprising. The protagonist, a priest on the run, is the last surviving cleric in the state and is being hunted by a miscreant lieutenant.
But the book is set in historical reality. Catholic life in Mexico from 1910–1930 saw some of the most severe persecution of the Church in human history. The 1917 constitution meant that priests could not vote, religious orders were proscribed, religious education was outlawed, the Church could not own property, and public worship outside the church building was banned.
In 1924, President Plutarco Elías Calles came to power. The eugenicist who engaged with the occult vowed to crush the Church’s last vestiges of public influence, and in 1926 he introduced the “Law for Reforming the Penal Code”, which became unofficially known as “Calles Law”. The law enforced the 1917 constitution with new vigour, whilst also introducing other extreme measures such as limiting the number of priests to an egregiously small figure for such a vast population that still desired the sacraments, and fining them 500 Mexican pesos — about $4,500 in today’s money — for wearing clerical dress outside church.
Responding to the imposition, the Mexican bishops ordered all public worship to cease on 31 July 1926 in peaceful protest against the tyrannical government’s dictates. A few days later, the Catholic peasants themselves responded with an armed revolt invoking the name of Cristo Rey (Christ the King) as the patron of their resistance, amassing tens of thousands of militants with particularly strong heartlands in the west of the country.
With the battle cry Viva Cristo Rey, the militants linked themselves to the Feast of Christ the King, established by Pope Pius XI in 1925. Their entire movement was built around His, not the state’s, kingship. They would make daily consecrations to Christ the King. The Sacred Heart became their symbol, worn on scapulars when going into battle, used as their military badges, and carried on banners whenever they could hold processions. The Brigadas Femeninas de Santa Juana de Arco (women’s brigades) brought ammunition and supplies, whilst devoting themselves to Christ the King and catechising children.
Nicknamed the Cristeros — a slur meaning something like “Christ people” used by government forces — they brought the Mexican state, backed by the United States, to its knees. In 1929, the government agreed to reopen churches, permit priests to return to ministry, end the execution of clergy, and abolish clergy quotas.
One of the most celebrated heroes of the Cristeros was Blessed Miguel Pro. Having completed his priestly studies in the Society of Jesus abroad, he returned to Mexico at the height of Catholic persecution to serve the clandestine Church. Murdered by government forces under the false pretext of being responsible for the failed assassination of the former anti-clerical president Álvaro Obregón, Blessed Miguel died with a crucifix in one hand, a rosary in the other, and saying, “With all my heart I forgive my enemies.”
His feast is today and, with happy felicity, this year falls on Christ the King. Introduced one hundred years ago in the papal encyclical Quas Primas, with the first celebration taking place the following year, the Feast of Christ the King was intended to discourage the “plague of secularism” of the post–First World War era that removed the centrality of the Faith from public life.
A century later it is needed more than ever. From Britain, where pro-life MPs were belittled for allowing their faith to influence their objection to assisted suicide, to the United States, where border official Tom Homan told Catholic bishops to worry about “fixing the Catholic Church” rather than dare to raise moral objections to domestic policy, governments are becoming secularised and replaced by man-made ideologies.
More worryingly, the Church is increasingly persecuted on a global scale. In 2024, in Nigeria alone, 3,100 Christians were killed for their faith, with a further 2,830 kidnapped. In India, in the same year, 62,000 Christians were forced to leave their homes. Globally, 14,766 churches or church properties were attacked.
There is a need, now more than ever, to take back what secularism and the enemies of Christianity have subjugated. The Church needs fresh armies of Cristeros to make known that Christ is King.
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