Bartolomé de las Casas's famous 1552 Confesionario sought to employ the power of the Church and the confessional to wrest some small measure of justice for the native peoples who suffered from the Spaniards’ rapacious greed. In doing so, Las Casas articulated an innovative theology that declared that all Spaniards who had participated in, or benefited from, the conquest and exploitation of native peoples lived in mortal sin. Before permitting them to participate in the sacrament of absolution, Las Casas required them to make legally binding public declarations of their guilt, with the promise of full restitution for the spiritual and physical damage they had done. Only then could they be absolved of their sins.
David Orique outlines the evolution of Las Casas's thought and work as he developed a practical application of the doctrine of restitution between 1516 and 1547. In doing so, he provides a useful and insightful review of the historical context that influenced Las Casas's thought and Las Casas's attempts to reconcile the desires of the colonizers with the interests of the indigenous peoples they exploited. Orique shows how Las Casas utilized a tripartite scheme of divine, natural, and human law drawn from the writings of Thomas Aquinas and then sought the approval of theologians to legitimize his confessional guidelines.
In the Confesionario, Las Casas required penitents to first confess their sins, show contrition, sign over complete legal power of attorney over their assets to the confessor, revoke any previous wills to the contrary, and free all native slaves. He then required confessors to make a careful assessment of their guilt. This process included an inventory of the penitent's wealth and the options available for restitution based on the penitent's activities and circumstances. Conquistadors had to restore and repopulate villages they had destroyed and promise never to do so again. Merchants had to return any wealth they acquired from selling supplies or weapons to conquistadors. Slave owners had to free their slaves and pay them a fair price for their services. Las Casas demanded full compensation whenever possible. Poor Spaniards, however, could work off their debt through service, while wealthy Spaniards should be reduced to poverty before absolution could be made. Encomenderos arrived in the Indies with nothing; therefore, he believed they should die with nothing.
Las Casas wanted the act of absolution to be a healing activity in which penitents expressed real contrition and sought pardon of the indigenous people they had injured. This permitted the reconciliation of the aggrieved parties. The penitents had to confess all of their sins to the priest and then restore what had been lost. Las Casas understood that restitution (that is, making whole again) was not always possible because people had been killed and property destroyed. In those cases, he allowed satisfaction in the form of compensation for the injuries suffered.
Orique concludes the volume with a clear and readable annotated translation of the Confesionario. This little book makes available for the first time in English this important document with the historical and theological context necessary to understand its significance. When paired with Las Casas's more famous work the Very Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies, the Confesionario provides a window into what motivated Las Casas and the ways he sought to employ Catholic theology and Spanish law to protect and compensate the native peoples whose homelands were being overrun and devastated by the European invaders.
