Cristero War - Aftermath of The War and The Toll On The Church

Aftermath of The War and The Toll On The Church

The government in many cases did not abide by the terms of the truce and, in violation of its terms, executed some 500 Cristero leaders and 5,000 other Cristeros. Particularly offensive to Catholics after the supposed truce was Calles' insistence on a complete state monopoly on education, suppressing all Catholic education and introducing secular education in its place: "We must enter and take possession of the mind of childhood, the mind of youth." Calles' military persecution of Catholics would be officially condemned by left-socialist leaning President Lázaro Cárdenas and the Mexican Congress in 1935. Between 1935 and 1936 Cardenas had Calles and many of his close associates arrested and forced them into exile soon afterwards. Freedom of worship was no longer suppressed, although some states still refused to repeal Calles' policy, and relations with the church improved while Cardenas was president.

Government disregard for the church, however, did not relent until 1940, when President Manuel Ávila Camacho, a practicing Catholic, took office. Church buildings in the country still belonged to the Mexican government and the nation's policies regarding the church still fell into federal jurisdiction. Under Camacho, the bans against church, though lawfully required either throughout the country or in just some Mexican states, were no longer enforced anywhere in Mexico.

The effects of the war on the Church were profound. Between 1926 and 1934 at least 40 priests were killed. There were 4,500 priests serving the people before the rebellion, but by 1934 there were only 334 licensed by the government to serve 15 million people. The rest had been eliminated by emigration, expulsion and assassination. By 1935, 17 states had no priests at all.

The end of the Cristero War affected emigration to the United States. "In the aftermath of their defeat, many of the Cristeros--by some estimates as much as 5 percent of Mexico's population--fled to America . Many of them made their way to Los Angeles, where they found a protector in John Joseph Cantwell, the bishop of what was then the Los Angeles-San Diego diocese." Under Archbishop Cantwell's sponsorship the Cristero refugees became a substantial community in Los Angeles, in 1934 staging a parade some 40,000 strong through the city.