One scholar has written that on May 28, 1926, the Masons awarded him a medal of merit for his persecution of Catholics. Some conservatives have explained Elías Calles's anticlericalism as rooted in his being a Freemason. Calles seized church property, expelled all foreign priests, and closed the monasteries, convents and religious schools. Chihuahua, for example, enacted a law permitting only a single priest to serve the entire Catholic congregation of the state. dollars at the time) a priest who criticized the government could be imprisoned for five years. For instance, wearing clerical garb in public (i.e., outside Church buildings) earned a fine of 500 pesos (approximately 250 U.S. This provided specific penalties for priests and individuals who violated the provisions of the 1917 Constitution. In June 1926, he signed the "Law for Reforming the Penal Code", known unofficially as the "Calles Law". Calles applied the anti-clerical laws stringently throughout the country and added his own anti-clerical legislation. This uneasy "truce" between the government and the Church ended with the 1924 election of Plutarco Elías Calles, a strident atheist. Although he shared Carranza's anti-clerical sentiments, he applied the measures selectively, only in areas where Catholic sentiment was weakest.
Carranza was overthrown by the machinations of his one-time ally Álvaro Obregón in 1919, who succeeded to the presidency in late 1920. When the anti-clerical measures were enacted in 1917, the President of Mexico was Venustiano Carranza. The government's anti-Catholic position extended to secularizing place names, but this trend had begun in 1857. The same article deprived priests and bishops of the right to vote, to criticize government policy, and to create any form of political organization. In some states, such as Michoacán, this power would be used to restrict the number of priests to the point that the Church effectively could not function. 24).Īrticle 130 of the new Constitution also allowed the government to restrict the number of functioning clergy. 5), forbade any religious activity outside of church buildings (now owned by the government), and mandated that such religious activity would be overseen by the government (art. The Constitution of 1917 also closed and forbade the existence of monastic orders (art. This second prohibition was sometimes interpreted to mean that the Church could not even give religious instruction to children within the churches on Sundays, effectively destroying the ability of Catholics to be educated in their own religion.
Article 27 prohibited any future acquisition of such property, and ordered the closing of all Church-run primary schools (art. Other policies included the expulsion of foreign clergy and the seizure of Church properties.Īll religions, not only the Catholic Church, had their properties intervened and these became part of the national patrimony. The 1917 Constitution of Mexico, resulting from the Mexican Revolution, as well as a similar one instituted by Benito Juárez in 1857 (1857 Constitution of Mexico), sought to secularize the country and remove the influence of the Roman Catholic Church, through restrictions on the clergy's political activities.
The Cristero War (also known as the Cristiada) of 1926 to 1929 was an uprising and counter-revolution against the Mexican government of the time, set off by religious persecution of Catholics, specifically the strict enforcement of the anti-clerical provisions of the Mexican Constitution of 1917 and the expansion of further anti-clerical laws.
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