No ordinary bishop.

• Author: Benjamin, Medea
• Position: Diocese of San Cristobal, Mexico, Bishop Samuel Ruiz

When I joined Bishop Samuel Ruiz on his Fast for Peace in December 1994, I didn't expect that he would be sleeping with the other fasters on the hard wooden floor of the cathedral. But Bishop Ruiz is no ordinary bishop.

Ruiz (who is known affectionately as Don Samuel or Tatic, which means "our father" in Tzeltal) is the son of migrant workers who picked vegetables in Texas and California. He became a bishop when he was only thirty-five, was assigned to the diocese of San Cristobal in 1960, and has been working there ever since.

"I came to San Cristobal to convert the poor," Don Samuel recalled, "but they ended up converting me. They gave new purpose and meaning to my faith. After witnessing the oppression, the poverty, the marginalization of the indigenous people, I realized I had to devote myself to building a system that eliminates inequalities and promotes sharing."

During his thirty-five years in Chiapas, the bishop has done just that. He turned the San Cristobal Cathedral into a hub of organizing for indigenous rights. He promoted social-development projects, literacy campaigns, health committees to recover traditional medicine, a human-rights center, and indigenous organizations. It was therefore only logical that after the rebel uprising, the bishop would be chosen by the Zapatistas as a mediator with the government. After all, he had been mediating between the Indians and the state for a long, long time.

It was also logical that the cattle ranchers and the local business elite would see the bishop as the devil incarnate and accuse him of being the Zapatista ringleader. "We Mexicans know perfectly well that the Red Bishop Samuel Ruiz gave the orders, the plan, the logistical support, the organizational genesis, and the Leninist-Christian ideology that is behind the guerrillas," declared conservative writer E. Kastell.

"You know why Marcos is only a subcommander?" a San Cristobal restaurant owner asked me. "Because the bishop is his commander."

Federico Serrano Figueroa, coordinator of a group of businessmen and cattle ranchers called COCECH (the Coalition of Citizen Organizations of the State of Chiapas), is so convinced that Bishop Ruiz is the source of destabilization in the state that he is pressuring the Vatican to remove Don Samuel. "The bishop doesn't preach love but class struggle," Serrano insisted. "There will be no reconciliation as long as he remains in Chiapas."

Bishop Ruiz is not the first bishop in Chiapas accused of...