Sept 24th, 2018
James P. Ronda’s, “We Are Well As We Are”: An Indian Critique of Seventeenth-Century Christian Missions is a brief analyzation of the encounters of European Missionaries with Canada’s Indigenous peoples. The article challenges the dated idea that European religions are superior to the indigenous counterparts. Through using statements from both European missionaries and Indigenous Shamans, Ronda shows how most of the indigenous peoples rejected the Jesuits and Christians religious teachings with just pure logical conjecture. Ronda finds an interesting rhetoric in the idea that in most teachings Indigenous religions are the ones of witchcraft and sorcery while to the Indigenous peoples find the teachings of the Europeans accompanied with diseases that came with them was the true sorcery.
Through some of the statements from the indigenous peoples it is truly remarkable how easily most turned down the teachings of the Europeans. The Indigenous peoples denounced the ideas of sinning and heaven/hell, with using pure logic. The idea that one could sin in one’s mind was easily put down by one Indigenous remark, “As for me, I do not know what it is to have bad thoughts,” (Ronda, P. 69).  The Indigenous religions after life was described as a place of, “morally neutral surrounding,” (Ronda, P.70) so the idea that one would by sent to a torturous after life, hell, due to one bad thought went against all of their teachings.
One thing that popped out to me about Ronda’s work is that he seems to always come back to an idea of just how truly similar both religions actually are. The European missionaries first called the Indigenous healers sorcerers because of they incorporated their deity’s and religion into healing one who was sick. But eventually the indigenous peoples believed that the European missionaries were the true sorcerers when small pox began to ravage the indigenous peoples. Believing that the European missionaries had brought cursed objects over from Europe.
James P. Ronda’s critique on the Jesuit and Christian missionaries’ interactions with Indigenous peoples of Canada casts a better light on the ways of the indigenous peoples of Canada. Showing that they are not just uncultured savages but are actually ones of great culture and astounding logical discussions. Ronda finds that Indigenous peoples of the sixteen-hundreds are not the only ones that appeared to take part in some kind sorcery, showing that some missionaries were accused of suspect behavior. Culminating in the idea that both religions are truly no that dissimilar. This work helps open my knowledge up and away from biased European documentation into a better understanding of how Canada’s first peoples were actually capable of great discussion and even clearer thought then most European setters in the seventeenth century.