Indigenous Peoples Day

 Today is Indigenous Peoples Day, a holiday in many places, including the United States. It used to be called Columbus Day after the "genocidal maniac," Christopher Columbus. Although still officially called Columbus Day, many cities and places have replaced it with Indigenous Peoples Day ("IPD"). The reason should be clear. According to one source:

In 2020, the Movement for Black Lives has inspired people to protest and reject racist symbols and institutions. This has led to several positive changes for Native people, including the renaming of the Washington NFL team, exposure of medical racism in Indian Country, and removal of racist monuments. However, Columbus Day remains a widely celebrated holiday in the U.S. that glorifies a false narrative of America’s founding and erases the genocide of Native peoples. (See https://illuminatives.org/indigenouspeoplesday2020/). 

The idea for IPD began in 1977 and gained traction leading up to the 500 year anniversary of Columbus' voyage in 1492. According to another source:

The date of Columbus' arrival in the new world on October 12th 1492 was adopted by many countries across the Americas and the Caribbean as a public holiday. In recent decades, the awareness that colonization by Spain and other European nations spelled disaster for the indigenous peoples had led to almost all of these holidays being replaced by a 'Day of the Races', which focuses on celebrating the heritage and contribution to the Americas of those who were here before Columbus. That this approach has been taken up in the USA is not surprising, particularly in states which have a substantial indigenous community. South Dakota made its change in 1990. To date, the only other states to have switched from Columbus Day are Maine and New Mexico who both adopted Indigenous People's Day in 2019. (https://www.officeholidays.com/holidays/usa/us-indigenous-peoples-day). 

Here, in a nutshell, is the Socialist/Communist/Masonic revision of history:

The indigenous peoples of North and South America were all "noble savages," who lived in peace with each other and nature. They were very civil and moral. Their way of life was superior to most. Then came the "White European Devils" led by the nefarious villain, Christopher Columbus. These depraved men introduced disease, alcohol, drugs, and made them slaves. They destroyed the land and their way of life. Columbus wanted to wipe out the indigenous peoples and was nearly successful. They imposed Christianity upon them to make them subservient, and were really only interested in wealth and fame for themselves. Columbus and Christianity destroyed the best of the Earth's cultures. 

This is the sheer nonsense being sold to the general public and to students in public schools/Vatican II sect schools. This post will show: (a) the myth of the "noble savage," (b) the true character of Christopher Columbus, and (c) the benefit of Christianity and Catholic culture. 

Just Savages--Not Noble

(My sources for this section include The Last Days of the Incas [2008], by Kim MacQuarrie, The Jesuit Relations [2019] by Allan Greer, and Cannibals and Kings [1991] by Marvin Harris. ---Introibo)

Pre-Columbian North America was not like the animated movie Pocahontas. According to “Slavery and Native Americans in British North America and the United States: 1600 to 1865,” by Tony Seybert, “Most Native American tribal groups practiced some form of slavery before the European introduction of African slavery into North America.” (See https://mmslibrary.files.wordpress.com/2009/10/slavery-and-native-americans-in-british-north-america-and-the-united-states.pdf). 

“Enslaved warriors sometimes endured mutilation or torture that could end in death as part of a grief ritual for relatives slain in battle. Some Indians cut off one foot of their captives to keep them from running away.”  Things changed when the Europeans arrived, however: “Indians found that British settlers… eagerly purchased or captured Indians to use as forced labor. More and more, Indians began selling war captives to whites.” (Ibid). Yes, the so-called noble savages sold their own into slavery.

According to Kim MacQuarrie, ritual human sacrifice was widespread in the Americas. The Incas, for example, practiced ritual human sacrifice to appease their gods, either executing captive warriors or “their own specially raised, perfectly formed children..." At the re-consecration of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan in 1487, the Aztecs performed a mass human sacrifice of an estimated 80,000 enslaved captives in four days. Here, in New York State, when the Iroquois tribe captured  warriors of another tribe, they had their fingers cut off, were forced to set each other on fire, had their skinned stripped off and (according to Greer) in one case, “the torture continued throughout the night, building to a fervor, finally ending at sunrise by cutting the scalp open, forcing sand into the wound, and dragging the mutilated body around the camp. When they had finished, the Iroquois carved up and ate parts of his body.” The very word "cannibal" comes from Canibales, the Spanish name for the Caribs, a West Indies tribe that practiced eating other humans for food as well as for superstitious reasons connected to their pagan belief system. 

The North American Martyrs (six Jesuit priests and two laymen canonized in 1930) were brutally murdered by Iroquois and Mohawk Indians. According to numerous sources, the name “Mohawk” comes from the Algonquin for “flesh eaters.” Anthropologist Marvin Harris writes that the Aztecs viewed their prisoners as “marching meat.” 

In sum: The idea that indigenous peoples were "noble savages" is only true if you believe that slavery, torture, and cannibalism are "noble undertakings." 

Christopher Columbus: Man of Faith

(Sources: The Untold Story of Christopher Columbus: The Last Crusader [1992], by George Grant; The Critics of Columbus: The Character Assassination of a Great Explorer [2015]by Richard DiGiacomo ). 

 Although a man with flaws, Columbus is not some "genocidal monster." Christopher Columbus was born in the Republic of Genoa in 1451.  According to Grant, "He [Columbus] observed the fasts of the church most faithfully, confessed and made communion often, read the Divine Office like a churchman, hated blasphemy and profane swearing, and was most devoted to Our Lady and to the seraphic father St. Francis; seemed very grateful to God for benefits received from the Divine Hand, wherefore, as in the proverb, he hourly admitted that God had conferred upon him great mercies, as upon David." (pg. 82). 

His son, Ferdinand, wrote of his father, "In matters of religion he was so strict that for fasting and saying all the canonical offices he might have been taken for a member of a religious order. And when he had to write anything, he would not try the pen without first writing these words, ‘Jesus cum Maria sit nobis in via.”(i.e., "May Jesus and Mary be with us on our way"). Columbus was a Third Order Franciscan, and he named his ship Santa Maria in honor of the Mother of God. On his historic first voyage, Columbus recited the Divine Office daily aboard his ship. Each night, he and his crew sang the Ave Maria in  honor of the Blessed Virgin. On September 15, 1492 (the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows) Columbus noted that while he was looking for the correct course for his ships to follow, he was guided by a “marvelous branch of fire that fell from the sky.”

Columbus needed gold to help the Spanish who funded his voyage. Queen Isabella wanted to help with a Crusade against the Moslem hoards. In a letter to Pope Alexander VI, Columbus wrote,

“The enterprise must be undertaken in order to spend any profits therein for the redemption of the Sepulcher and the Temple Mount unto Holy Church.” Historian Grant concludes, “Clearly, the motivations of Columbus were shaped by the eons long conflict between Christendom and Islam. The evidence is inescapable. He sailed, not to discover a new world, but to find a way to recover the old one." Truly, spreading the Catholic faith and acquiring riches so as to finance the retaking of Jerusalem from the Mohammedans were the raison d'etre of Columbus’ voyages.

The invectives against Columbus were largely from Protestants and received their biggest boost from one Aaron Goodrich, who wrote a book in the 19th century entitled, A History of the Character and Achievements of the So-Called Christopher Columbus. He attacked Columbus as a greedy slave trader, claiming that he participated in the African slave trade, but offers no evidence to prove this assertion. He claimed that Columbus intended to bring slavery to the New World from the very beginning, although all the accounts by Columbus and others disprove it. He dismissed Columbus’ claims of only taking cannibals and rebels as slaves by saying that no one in the Caribbean was a cannibal. (This claim has been roundly refuted by both historians and sociologists). 

According to DiGiacomo, by the 1980s some even portrayed Columbus as a bumbling fool and a poor navigator who accidentally discovered America. Others emphasized his avarice and said he was obsessed with gold. Still others portrayed him as a half-crazed religious fanatic. Writers even speculated as to the nature of his degenerative illness or began to speak of his mental health decline. During the observation of the Quincentennial of the Discovery of America in 1992, Columbus' name was once again dragged through the mud. He was reviled as a genocidal maniac by radical protestors at universities, such as students at UC Berkeley who waved bloody swords and called Columbus a murderer. Some Native Americans circulated posters calling him a pirate; and others that declared, “Columbus Didn’t Discover Me."

Books were published denouncing him as the "Father of American slavery." Columbus statues were removed from public squares. Columbus Day celebrations were cancelled or scaled down across the country and schools began to drop the holiday from their calendars. Some people have even called for a celebration of Indigenous American Day in its stead. Many communities are continuing to take down statues of Columbus. Some even want his name removed from all of the many places in America that were named for him. This is in stark contrast to the events of only a hundred years before, when Columbus was widely celebrated and held up as an American hero. (See Ch. 10)

Columbus kept no slaves of his own. Columbus even adopted an Indian orphan as his son. He did, however, take some slaves for Spain because he felt that he needed the money to pay debts, since the colonies were not producing enough gold. He was under intense pressure from the Spanish monarchs to show a profit, so this is probably the reason. (See Ch. 11). He died on May 20, 1506, his last words being like unto those of Our Lord, "In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum." ("Into Thy Hands O Lord, I commend my spirit."). His cause for canonization was introduced in the Vatican, but was halted under Pope Pius IX when it was discovered he had fathered an illegitimate child. 

The Benefits of the Faith

Columbus is not (and will never be) a saint. Despite his failings, he was a Catholic who held the Faith. To be certain, there were bad things that took place during his voyages, and he cannot be completely absolved of all blame. He strove to be a good man by picking himself up, confessing his sins, and trying (with the help of God's grace) to amend his life.  The man who expressed this best was no less than His Holiness Pope Leo XIII. In 1892, the 400th anniversary of Columbus' discovery, he promulgated the encyclical Quarto Abeunte Saeculo. Here is what Pope Leo wrote about Christopher Columbus:

Now that four centuries have sped since a Ligurian first, under God's guidance, touched shores unknown beyond the Atlantic, the whole world is eager to celebrate the memory of the event, and glorify its author. Nor could a worthier reason be found where through zeal should be kindled. For the exploit is in itself the highest and grandest which any age has ever seen accomplished by man; and he who achieved it, for the greatness of his mind and heart, can be compared to but few in the history of humanity. 

By his toil another world emerged from the unsearched bosom of the ocean: hundreds of thousands of mortals have, from a state of blindness, been raised to the common level of the human race, reclaimed from savagery to gentleness and humanity; and, greatest of all, by the acquisition of those blessings of which Jesus Christ is the author, they have been recalled from destruction to eternal life. Europe, indeed, overpowered at the time by the novelty and strangeness of the discovery, presently came to recognize what was due to Columbus, when, through the numerous colonies shipped to America, through the constant intercourse and interchange of business and the ocean-trade, an incredible addition was made to our knowledge of nature, and to the commonwealth; whilst at the same time the prestige of the European name was marvelously increased...

But there is, besides, another reason, a unique one, why We consider that this immortal achievement should be recalled by Us with memorial words. For Columbus is ours; since if a little consideration be given to the particular reason of his design in exploring the mare tenebrosum, and also the manner in which he endeavoured to execute the design, it is indubitable that the Catholic faith was the strongest motive for the inception and prosecution of the design; so that for this reason also the whole human race owes not a little to the Church...

For we have the record of not a few brave and experienced men, both before and after Christopher Columbus, who with stubbornness and zeal explored unknown lands and seas yet more unknown. And the memory of these, man, mindful of benefits, rightly holds, and will hold in honor; because they advanced the ends of knowledge and humanity, and increased the common prosperity of the race, not by light labour, but by supreme exertion, often accompanied by great dangers. But there is, nevertheless, between these and him of whom we speak, a generous difference. He was distinguished by this unique note, that in his work of traversing and re-traversing immense tracts of ocean, he looked for a something greater and higher than did these others. We say not that he was unmoved by perfectly honorable aspirations after knowledge, and deserving well of human society; nor did he despise glory, which is a most engrossing ideal to great souls; nor did he altogether scorn a hope of advantages to himself; but to him far before all these human considerations was the consideration of his ancient faith, which questionless dowered him with strength of mind and will, and often strengthened and consoled him in the midst of the greatest difficulties. This view and aim is known to have possessed his mind above all; namely, to open a way for the Gospel over new lands and seas.(Emphasis mine). 

Think of these benefits brought by Columbus:

1. The One True Faith (imagine if the Mohammedans had arrived first!).

2. Education

3. Putting an end to cannibalism and torture

4. Despite disease, there also came advances in medicine which helped far beyond diseases that came

5. The Rule of Law 

6. Abolishment of polygamy and, with marriage, came stable families

7. Scientific advancement in farming and all areas of life

Conclusion

Christopher Columbus is reviled by those who hate Christian culture. The real false narrative comes from BLM and other leftist/Communists who want to perpetuate myths about "noble savages" and "genocidal Christians." Indigenous Peoples Day is nothing more than a reversion to paganism and a repudiation of all things good that come to us from Christ the Lord. As Pope Leo XIII wrote in his encyclical: In order, therefore, that the commemoration of Columbus may be worthily observed, religion must give her assistance to the secular ceremonies. And as at the time of the first news of the discovery public thanksgiving was offered by the command of the Sovereign Pontiff to Almighty God, so now we have resolved to act in like manner in celebrating the anniversary of this auspicious event.

On this October 12, 2020, I wish all my readers a Happy Columbus Day!