--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Lambourne, Alfred collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 13 number: 9 published: 1910-07 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Alfred Lambourne, "Church of San Xavier del Bac," *Improvement Era* 13, no. 9 (July 1910): 797–801.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1309unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1309unse start_page: 797 end_page: 801 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1910-07) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1309unse publication_year: 1910 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1910, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Church of San Xavier del Bac Photo by C. R. Savage. Church of San Xavier Del Bac. BY ALFRED LAMBOURNE. The sun went down hot, as we forded the shallow Santa Cruz river. The heaps of jagged mountains, clustered upon the desert horizon, glowed with its red light. Each picacho appeared semitransparent, as if it had been saturated with fiery heat, or had been changed to ruby. The sky was cloudless, and soon became of that peculiar, bluish-green hue characteristic of the Arizona twilight. The glow upon the distant mountains turned deeper and deeper, becoming, ere it vanished altogether, a most wondrous crimson. A rich, crimson stain, too, lingered long upon the old adobe western wall of the Mission Dolores. The ruined building, with its open windows, tottering to its fall upon the low mound, and surrounded by marsh lands in which grew tall, coarse grasses with here and there a gaunt, angular thorn tree, bore a saddened aspect at the approach of night. The strange, old church we had been to visit, is known as the 798 IMPROVEMENT ERA. San Xavier del Bac. It is situated nine miles to the southward of Tucson and stands in the midst of a most dreary and desolate landscape. Around it is the level desert, broken with near piles of lava rock, that emerge from the sands like islands above the sea. In the distance are seen the mountains, flat-topped ranges, or detached groups of volcanic peaks of singular forms, jutting up one behind another in grotesque savageness, and ranging in tints from the palest ashen-grays to livid reds and dark, indigo-toned blues. A palo verde stands here and there in some wash, or a tall green column of the cereus giganteus, the rigid trunks of the latter giving a peculiar stiffness of effect to the scene. Altogether it is one of the very last places in which one might expect to see a sacred edifice. The building itself is highly picturesque, and even approaches the imposing, when not too critically examined. The design is bold, with its dome and towers and, at a distance, rich facade. Around it runs a wall, and at one side is the Casa Morte, and at the other a long range of buildings which appear to combine the uses of dormitory for priests and travelers, as well as being a hospital for the sick among the surrounding tribes of Indians. The church is in the Moorish style of flamboyant architecture, and dates back to somewhere between 1690 and 1700, making it one of the oldest mission churches hereabouts. It was founded by the Jesuit and Franciscan Fathers in their arduous and self-sacrificing labors, and it was constructed under adverse conditions and with unskilled workmen. It is built of rock and brick, covered with a yellowish-gray plaster, a plaster that has become very hard through the adding of the blood of cattle to the mixture. A motly group of Papago Indians were gathered around the entrance in the church wall as our vehicle came up. They were from the poor, miserably built huts near by, and one of them, an Indian boy with an immense, naked cavalry sword, stood guard at the door. This boy, with his evident self-conscious pride at our seeing him thus fulfiling his office, was highly ludicrous. But on the lower steps, those leading to the doorway, was a sight pathetic. This was the venerable resident priest. He was totally blind, bent with extreme age, his skin covered with a thousand wrinkles, and his hair as white as snow. In his hands was a musical instrument. CHURCH OF SAN XAVIER DEL BAC. 799 It was made of reeds, and the feeble notes that he drew from their depths were as mournful in sound as the appearance of the old man was sad. We entered the church. On the walls are several old paintings reputed to be of considerable value, and most hideous frescoes, too, depicting the joys of paradise and the tortures of the RUINS OF MISSION DOLORES. Sketch by the Author. damned. Fortunately it was Easter Sunday, and we could not have chosen a more opportune time for our visit to San Xavier del Bac. In spite of the sterile surroundings, the poor Indians, who mostly make up the devotees of the place, had found something of suitable greenness to decorate the altar and various other portions of the church interior. Later we gazed at the festival; saw the tottering form of the aged priest led up the aisle to the altar steps, and listened to his quavering voice as he intoned the chant. Sheaves of barley were carried in the procession and afterwards placed on the altar steps. At the festival's close, the old man was led back to the outer door, and there, standing in the sunlight, with trembling hand extended, he received such homely contributions from his flock, sometimes a sweet-cake, sometimes a lump of sugar, as the poverty of the donors compelled them to give. 800 IMPROVEMENT ERA. It impressed us that there was a singular harmony of sadness about it all— the dreary and sterile landscape, the half-finished, the already half-ruined church, the blind old priest, the poor Indian worshipers and their wretched village. We had begun the previous day with an early visit to the banks of the Santa Cruz. The Spanish-Mexican women were there ahead of us. With the women arrayed in their white bodices and scarlet petticoats, with the washing done — for the coming festival day, perhaps — in the primitive way, rubbing on aflat stone or beating thereon, and then rinsed in the clear, passing water; and as the women were mostly young, and a few who might truly be called handsome, with the lithe, slender figures, the black hair and lustrous eyes of the south, the sight was a pretty one; and all in keeping with the hour and scene. Now there was a harmony of another kind, but in strange discord with the emblematic nature of the festival, which should be a joyous one, indeed, to be expressive of a belief in the resurrection. - jm jj L ■ • 1 ■k j |^l HEBER SCOWCROFT. Appointed and sustained a member of the Church Auditing Committee, at the April Conference, 1910. See sketch in "Passing Events."