Die Anfänge der Kirche auf den Karibischen Inseln: Die Geschichte der Bistümer Santo Domingo, Concepción de la Vega, San Juan de Puerto Rico und Santiago de Cuba von ihrer Entstehung (1511/22) bis zur Mitte des 17. Jahrhunderts by Johannes Meier (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 339 The authors have provided a service in collecting data about this churchman who, in the words of Monsignor Robert Lynch, was indeed one of those known as a "Vatican II bishop." Timothy M. Dolan Pontifical NorthAmerican College Latin American Die Anfänge der Kirche auf den Karibischen Inseln: Die Geschichte der Bistümer Santo Domingo, Concepción de la Vega, San fuan de Puerto Rico und Santiago de Cuba von ihrer Entstehung (1511/22) bis zur Mitte des 17.fahrhunderts. By Johannes Meier. [Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft , Supplementa, Volume XXXVIII.] (Immensee, Switzerland :Verein zur Förderung der Missionswissenschaft. 1991. Pp. xxxiv, 313. sFr. 44,- paperback.) It was the aim of the church historian Johannes Meier to recount and to analyze the history of the Catholic Church in the Caribbean Islands from the beginning of Spanish overseas expansion until the mid-seventeenth century. He has accomplished his goal quite well. This book consists of a foreword, an introduction,five chapters, a conclusion, a place and person register, a picture appendix, and maps. The twenty-five-page bibliography, itself a helpful tool to anyone interested in Latin American church history, reveals Meier's acquaintance with literature in many languages. Meier describes in Chapter One the origin of the Caribbean dioceses of Santo Domingo, Concepción de la Vega, San Juan de Puerto Rico, and Santiago de Cuba. In Chapter Two he discusses the bishops. Chapter Three deals with the secular clergy. Chapter Four deals with the religious orders, namely, the Franciscans ,the Dominicans, the Mercedarians, and others; and Chapter Five deals with the Christian laity, namely, European settlers, native Indians, and African slaves. On October 12, 1492, when Christopher Columbus discovered the "Old World,"he erected crosses at designated places and announced that Christianity would occupy a strong and privileged place in the "New World." The interdependence of Church and State rested on the royal patronage, and within the milieu of the patronage there developed a hierarchical church. Thanks to the religious revival in Spain under the leadership of Cardinal Jiménez de Cisneros, the Church in the beginning sent qualified personnel to America. The first decade was characterized by clergy from both the dioceses and the orders, but later the Council of Trent strengthened the position of the bishops, and when the bishops in the latter third of the sixteenth century be- 340 BOOK REVIEWS came more concerned with pastoral work, the secular clergy grew. The state increased its control through the Council of the Indies, and in the seventeenth century, church-state relations were consolidated. By that time Hispanoamerican Christendom had found its identity. Thus, in this corner of the earth, where hurricanes and pirate raids took their toll, the four dioceses with which this book is concerned left a memorable mark on the history of the Church. Meier's richly detailed monograph is of substantial scholarly merit. It is extensively researched and packed with information. He relies on unpublished manuscripts in the Archives of the Indies in Seville and on published documents as well as on relevant secondary materials. This balanced study should be useful to students, teachers, and experts who are seeking information on the Church and its missionary efforts in Spain's overseas kingdoms. This book should be made available to as many scholars as possible by way ofboth English and Spanish translations. One negative aspect of the book from the point of view of some readers who do not command foreign languages might be Meier's liberal and repeated use ofthe custom ofmany European scholars to insert long Latin and Spanish quotations within the German text. Nevertheless, Meier's book is a valuable publication which merits attentive reading and rereading. Josephine H. Schulte St. Mary's University San Antonio, Texas Guatemala in the Spanish Colonial Period. By Oakah L. Jones, Jr. (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. 1993. Pp. xxi, 344. $38.95.) This well-organized and readable survey of colonial Guatemala in ten chapters provides the reader with a much-needed important study of the Kingdom of Guatemala from conquest to independence. Based on more than eight years of archival research, the reading of published documents and primary sources, and the works...