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October/November 1997

Germany vs Scientology
By Matt Johanson

To explain the furious hostility between Germany and the Church of Scientology, German officials might point to the story of a young man from Braunschweig named Juergen Behrndt.

Shortly before his graduation from technical school in 1989, Behrndt received an offer of free career counseling in a brochure from an employment agent in Hamburg. But the man turned out to be a Scientologist recruiter, and instead of employment advice, he gave Behrndt a copy of the Scientologists' Bible, Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. Then a woman from the Scientologists' Hamburg office began calling, Behrndt said, and pressuring him to take a 200-question personality test.

He did, beginning a six-year membership with the group, an endless series of "audits" of his mental health and classes to "stabilize" his mind. "When things went well, I paid ever-more money out of my pocket," Behrndt recalled. "When things went poorly, I was insulted and rebuked." In Behrndt's first year of membership, Scientology officials visited his parents with him seeking a DM 75,000 ($50,250) loan toward his activities. By the time he broke from the group in 1995, Behrndt had spent some DM 200,000 ($134,000), was unemployed and emotionally ravaged: "Many days I saw no reason to even get up."

However, the Church of Scientology describes the German situation differently. Its officials claim the German government is encouraging a resurgence of the Nazi regime's religious intolerance, but this time Scientologists, rather than Jews, are the target. Pointing to the decision of the major political parties and the state of Bavaria to ban Scientologists, the group ran full-page ads featuring swastikas in newspapers such as The New York Times and The Washington Post in an effort to resurrect memories of the Third Reich.

Gerhard Waterkamp, a German Scientologist who says his employer fired him because of his affiliation, explains the analogy. "It cannot compare with the Germany of 1941. I was allowed to leave the country. I was not killed." Waterkamp, 43, moved with his wife and two daughters to Glendale, California, last year because he could not find another job. "But this absolutely compares with what my mother told me about 1934 to 1940, when Jews were not killed but the Nazis kept them out of certain jobs and people boycotted their businesses. This is how it starts."

Nothing angers the German public more than statements like this. The Scientologists' campaign ignited a firestorm of media attention in Germany and abroad. Ignatz Bubis, the chairman of Germany's small Jewish community, said he was insulted and denounced the ads. The German government stated, the charges "are not only false, but also insult the victims of the Holocaust." The U. S. State Department agreed, though it has criticized the Germans' handling of the Scientology issue. "We aren't going to support the Scientologists' terror tactics against the German government," spokesman Nicholas Burns said. As Dan Hamilton, Associate Director of the Secretary of State's Policy Planning Department, said, "The stories that sell about Germany usually involve Nazis. That comparison was made here, but we think it's ridiculous."

"Intergalactic Holocaust"

Scientology sprouted in America in the 1950s. L. Ron Hubbard, a moderately successful science fiction author, founded the group and wrote Dianetics and other books that outline his principles. Scientologists believe that an intergalactic holocaust 75 million years ago caused mankind's spiritual problems. They perform "audits" of their members' mental states and offer expensive remedies in the form of counseling and self-improvement courses.

Scientology has fought long legal battles for recognition as a legitimate religion around the world; it claims eight million members, including 30,000 among Germany's 80 million residents. It has succeeded in many countries, including the United States, where a judge granted the group tax-exempt status in 1993 after the IRS had denied it for decades. Germany, however, considers Scientology a dangerous and greedy cult bent on manipulating and extorting its recruits for financial gain.

Claudia Nolte, Germany's Federal Minister for the Family, Senior Citizens, Women, and Youth, has been one of the most vocal critics, vowing to fight the group "with all means at my disposal" and calling for federal agents to monitor it. "Scientology aims for world domination and the destruction of our society," said Nolte, a member of Chancellor Helmut Kohl's Christian Democratic Union (CDU).

While Scientology took root in Germany decades ago, it became a consuming issue to the government in the late 1980s. "Members of the parliament received letters from concerned parents and relatives asking the government for action. We determined we had to do something," explained an official from the German Embassy in Washington, D.C. Like other German diplomats, he requested anonymity to speak about the issue for fear of harassment. In addition, members of the CDU claim Scientology produced a report entitled "Clear Germany" that outlined a plan "to infiltrate the economy, the social system and politics in Germany," though Scientology denies the charge.

The government's fight against Scientology has developed across many fronts in the last two years:

• An administrative court ruled in 1995 that Scientology's extensive marketing of books and courses make it a commercial enterprise under German law.
• A federal labor court that same year ruled that Scientology utilizes "inhumane and totalitarian practices," often separating members from their families to make them psychologically and financially dependent on the Scientology group. In its decision, the court quoted one of Hubbard's instructions to "make money, make more money--make other people produce so as to make money" and concluded that Scientology claims to be a church merely as a cover to pursue financial interests.
• Another court supported Federal Minister for Labor and Social Affairs Norbert Bluem's description of Scientology as a "contemptible cartel whose oppression and ringleaders are criminal."
• Postbank, the German credit network located in post offices, won the right to refuse to handle Scientology's business accounts last year in a Stuttgart district court. Postbank shut down four accounts Scientology held in Ulm because it did not want its name associated with the group. A Scientology attorney said 17 other banks in the area turned down the group's business.
• The CDU's youth organization last year called for a national boycott of Tom Cruise's film, Mission Impossible, because the American actor is a Scientologist. "The tactic of Scientology is to connect it with the notion of success," said Burkhard Remmers, head of the youth group in Lower Saxony. "That is aided by the many U.S. stars who go on publicity tours in Europe. But [being a member of] Scientology does not mean success." Members of the group distributed fliers warning movie-goers about Scientology at theaters; the film nonetheless grossed $23.6 million. Cruise himself said little about the issue: "I'm a Scientologist, but that's an entirely personal matter," he testily told the press during a promotional tour last summer. A Scientologist spokesman labeled the campaign "a rebellion of midgets."
• The CDU has campaigned for more protection, legal advice, and emergency financial help for potential Scientology drop-outs, to counter the "massive psychic, economic and legal pressure" the group employs to keep them in.
• Finally, after the parliament commissioned an investigation into the activities of Scientology and other "sects and psycho-cults," it was determined that the Church of Scientology would be placed under nationwide observation by federal and state anti-extremist watchdogs on "suspicion of anti-democratic intent." The year-long observation will assess whether Scientology can be classified as anti-constitutional.

"Radical Politicians"

The Scientologists counter that the government's accusations are nothing but a front to cover the true reason for its attacks: Government officials with ties to the mainstream churches are in a panic over declining membership and religious offerings. Members of Catholic and Protestant churches contribute financially to their churches through their income taxes, but that stops if they leave for a non-sanctioned group such as Scientology.

In fact, the only Germans interested in persecuting Scientology are "a handful of radical politicians very connected to the Roman Catholic and Lutheran churches who blame us for taking their money away," said Leisa Goodman, spokesperson at Scientology's Los Angeles headquarters. Despite the campaign--or perhaps because of it-- Scientology's numbers in Germany keep growing, she said.

"It continues to expand at a rapid rate because these reports have made the Germans very curious," said Goodman. "Many walk in and say, 'I don't understand why the government is harassing you this way.' Germany stands on its own in terms of degree of abuse," she said. "But it's not working. Their churches need to figure out how to give more to their members instead of targeting a group that is growing and expanding."

Scientology gained an unlikely ally in the U.S. State Department, which rebuked Germany's treatment of Scientologists in its annual world survey of human rights.

U.S. Reaction

"One could argue about the methods of Scientology," said the State Department's Hamilton, "but for our purposes we look at a single point: Do you discriminate against someone because he belongs to a group or because he's actually done something?"

The report noted examples of the former such as the political parties' exclusion policies, the short-lived Mission Impossible boycott and reports of job discrimination in the private sector. The segment is but a small part of the very positive assessment of human rights in Germany, and the State Department actually noted improvement on this issue over the previous year.

"Much of this is a debate between the media of both countries rather than a dispute between governments," said Hamilton. "[Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright made a point on her first trip to Germany of saying we consider this a non-issue." During her meeting with Chancellor Kohl, Albright also condemned the comparison Scientologists have made between Germany's current government and the Nazis. "We find that absolutely unacceptable," Hamilton said. "Germany is one of the freest nations and the most respectful of human rights.... The Scientologists have not helped themselves with this reaction."

Waterkamp says he worked as a manager in Weinheim at the Freudenberg Company, a manufacturer of automotive parts and textiles, until 1995. Then, somehow, his employers received a Scientology publication documenting that he and his wife completed a church seminar in Florida some years before, and fired him "on the spot." "I turned to the employment agencies and described my situation," he said. "I said, 'Yes, I'm a Scientologist, but I never speak about it, it's a private thing.' They said I would not find a job in Germany." After seven months of unemployment, Waterkamp decided to leave the country. Today he's with the Dohring Company working with information systems.

"I'm not sorry"

Waterkamp says he paid an average of DM 10,000 ($6,700) a year toward Scientology before moving to the United States. "Some years it may have amounted to DM 50,000 ($33,500) a year, and other years it didn't take anything when I practiced auditing at home," he said.

"I'm not sorry about a single penny I spent," said Waterkamp. "For me, it's a very valuable tool to improve family life.... In 17 years with the church I've met hundreds of Scientologists and I cannot remember a single case where a person was unhappy."

Except, perhaps, he noted, for the other Scientologists whom the Germans have hounded out of work. "I think it will be impossible to go back for the next five to ten years," he said. "I would not be able to find a job because of my religious beliefs.

"My mother is 75. She told me she's so happy I'm in the United States because she's afraid another catastrophe in Germany will happen," Waterkamp said. "Democracy was a gift to Germany after World War II. It's time politicians took better care of that gift."

This appraisal prompted groans from German diplomats.

"We have to be more sensitive of these radical, undemocratic movements," said the German embassy official. "After all, we had a very bad experience with such a movement 60 years ago."

Hubbard's writings call for "a civilization without insanity, without criminals, and without war, where the able can prosper and honest beings can have rights, and where man is free to rise to greater heights."

This contrasts wildly with the experience of Albert Anhut from the city of Hamburg: "Friends of mine landed in the gutter, began to booze, and became very sick." A 36-year-old graphic designer, Anhut says he lost DM 50,000 ($33,500) to Scientology in two years. "They had easy play with me," he lamented. "You give money, work, and effort for something that turns out to be a deceitful, empty lie."

Matt Johanson writes from San Francisco, California.

The Long Footprints of Communism: PDS on the Rise
By Rebecca A. Neuwirth

When it comes to retiring from political life, most politicians bow out with a few congratulatory speeches from colleagues and a toast of raised glasses. But when 84-year-old Stefan Heym stormed out of the Bundestag (German federal parliament) a couple of years ago, the body's oldest member created more of a demonstration than a celebration. His resignation on October 31, 1995 over a proposed bill to increase politicians' salaries put his former colleagues into an uncomfortable position. Heym had sacrificed his career and the power that went with it because, he said, he could not accept the selfish plan to raise his wages while voters in his small eastern Berlin district suffered from unemployment and poverty rates unprecedented in their lifetimes. He had been elected to help his constituents, not to pad his own nest, nor those of his co-workers in Bonn.

Heym's decision was a fitting swan song for a career that had seen him fighting fascists and reaching success in the former East Germany as an intellectual and author. But his resignation was also a statement against politics as usual.

Indeed, the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), which elected Heym into office, is all about ending business as usual. But that is where the consensus ends. What exactly the PDS wants to change is far less clear. And it is precisely this elusive agenda that will determine whether the PDS--which gained votes with astounding rapidity among citizens of the former East Germany in the years immediately following unification--can capitalize on its popularity. In a time when all parties of the left in Germany clamor to try to limit the damage of social cuts, the PDS is faced with the task of identifying a unique vision or disappearing into the history books.

The Legacy of Communism

As the successor party to the Socialist Unity Party (SED), which held absolute power in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), the PDS claims a mixed legacy at best. For many, the party's history suffices to condemn it. The fact that a large percentage of members were formerly in the SED increases the hostility in Bonn. Parliament representatives have been known to shun PDS speakers, leaving the room when they speak or refusing the courtesy of silence, and Chancellor Helmut Kohl has called the party leadership "extremist rabble." Some question the PDS's dedication to democracy and a few politicians have initiated a discussion about whether the PDS, like several extremist right-wing groups, is hostile to the constitution--a ruling that would justify permanent police surveillance of the party.

Nevertheless, in the last six years, the PDS has developed a few formidable politicians and defenders of its own. Until her recent decision to step down from the party leadership, 25-year-old Angela Marquardt (see GL, Feb./Mar. '97) was the up-and-coming party star. Gregor Gysi, who is known as a sharp-tongued, intelligent, and even sexy man by admirers and foes alike, is probably the most popular of all. His recent book Freche Sprüche (Cheeky Sayings) has risen to the bestseller list among residents of the former East Germany, and many feel that he is single-handedly responsible for the PDS's renewal and its rise in popularity. Although he recently toyed with retiring from politics altogether, Gysi--to the great relief of the PDS--has agreed to stay on for the next election (in 1998).

Gysi and other outspoken PDS leaders claim that the party has left its dictatorial roots behind. But allegations that leading party members were involved in the East German secret police (the Stasi) have plagued the PDS continuously. Recently, PDS Speaker Hanno Harnisch and Gysi himself have been accused of hiding Stasi pasts. Even if allegations are proved wrong--as Gysi claims they will be in his case--the continual controversies keep the past very present.

Nor does the party's new image mean making a total break with the past. The PDS is well aware of its dependence on former East German citizens who miss something of their past. In fact, it has built up its platform around saving part of the East German legacy. Under socialism, citizens of the GDR "experienced the elimination of unemployment, the virtual eradication of poverty, a comprehensive system of social security, important elements of social justice--in particular a high degree of equality of opportunity in the fields of health, education, and culture--as well as new rights for women and young people," states the party's official program. The PDS defends such favorable conditions, even as it tries to distance itself from the darker East German past.

The East German Vote

By recalling the East German past in a largely positive light, the PDS has taken up a protest position within unified Germany. It is a stance that has served the party well up until now. Whether this appeals to former GDR citizens' tendency to nostalgia (the well-known Ostalgie, which turned the Trabant car from a source of shame into a style statement overnight), or whether it strikes a chord of truth for them, one thing is for certain: The PDS's message has reached a surprising number of eager ears and willing ballots. The party has enjoyed significant growth in popularity over the last six years. The first federal parliamentary vote after unification in December of 1990 saw 11.1 percent of East German citizens supporting the PDS. That number increased to 19.8 percent in the latest federal parliamentary vote on October 16, 1994. East Berlin has proven especially fertile ground for the PDS, with 36.3 percent of voting residents supporting the PDS in the 1995 local elections, among them every second young voter.

In contrast, the party only recently started making efforts to win the votes of citizens of the former West Germany and the results show that the PDS may be better off in its own territory. In 1995 it won only 2.1 percent of West Berlin votes, and party leaders in Bonn have urged the Hamburg PDS organization to stay out of the upcoming elections there, which could hurt the party image more than it is likely to help. The party's presence in the Bundestag is due to its regional popularity alone: PDS candidates gained entrée to Bonn through direct mandates in certain areas of the former East Germany, but the party's aggregate votes have not added up to 5 percent of the national vote.

Many have claimed that the PDS has acted irresponsibly by harping on East Germans' dissatisfaction with unification. The PDS responds that other parties have ignored specific East German problems out of a lack of concern, not an interest in integration. The PDS has harshly criticized the shutting of industrial plants that once dotted the East German countryside, a course of action that it blames on profiteering and speculation during the process of privatization. In many instances, it has opposed the replacement of East German citizens from top positions by their western counterparts. According to the PDS, politicians have used a law that allows East German citizens to be investigated and then fired for involvement with the Stasi to facilitate a Verwestlichung, or westernization, of unified Germany's elite population. The PDS has won recognition by taking up these issues during a period in which every other party showed little interest.

This situation has altered within the last year. The major parties have implicitly given credence to the PDS: They have followed the party's lead in establishing a separate agenda for East Germany and focusing increased attention on the region's vote. But the change has not helped the PDS. The general interest in the East German vote does not translate into increased acceptance for the PDS: The Socialist Democratic Party (SPD) and Bündnis '90 (The Greens) have consistently rejected the PDS in coalitions. In fact, the party has won its greatest political success in Saxony-Anhalt, where it is tolerated by a hesitant minority Red-Green coalition.

Rather than leading the PDS to success, the general focus on the East German vote has started to jeopardize the PDS's only grasp on any power: its singular position as defender of the specific interests of former East Germans and its ability to get their votes. And if other parties manage to pull this pillar of the PDS's platform right out from under it, then the party can expect a hard fall.

An Issue for Everyone

If the PDS has been criticizing modern German society for a lot longer than other parties, it has been slow to name specific measures that it would like to see implemented. The PDS has much less experience with using power than with railing against it. The party is unified on little else besides the importance of defending the interests of citizens of the former GDR. It seems to include something for each type of voter and for each divergent interest within the party itself. The PDS's aims range from toppling the capitalist system of economics to organizing local "anti-fascists" to protect a left-wing bookseller in the outskirts of Berlin from skinhead attacks. It wants to be a party for workers and for intellectuals, welcoming to alternative youth and old SED members. In a recent article, former GDR citizen Konrad Weiss called the PDS's aims a mixture of the platforms of the Green Party and the SPD, "spiced with a few pinches of class warfare."

Slogans such as "housing is a human right" and "for women's equality" attest to the PDS's simple social politics. The party has been active in protesting the drastic social cutbacks of late, but it offers few original alternatives for saving money. In a newsletter article, Bundestag member Gregor Gysi takes up an old left-wing stance: Bonn should target "wasteful" programs, such as the transrapid express train from Berlin to Hamburg, estimated at 9 billion deutsche mark, and the expensive construction of new government buildings in Berlin. "The state has enough money" reads a flag waved at a recent student protest, and the PDS has taken up this motto. But as the urgency of the situation becomes more and more evident and cutbacks start taking effect, the cry is fading to a whimper. With the approach of the single European currency, there seem few ways to avoid tightening the proverbial belt and, indeed, most leftist parties have started cooperating to minimize the harm of expected budget cuts. Not the PDS: protest is its only clear agenda.

As far as a larger vision is concerned, the PDS offers a program that is familiar, if not convincing. Rejecting the current trend of economic globalization, the PDS's platform states: "Together we hold the opinion that it is the capitalist character of modern society that is causally responsible for endangering human civilization and culture, for the militarized character of international relations, for the crises of the world ecosystem and for the indescribable misery to be found above all in the Southern Hemisphere. We are of one mind that the rule of capital must be subdued." How exactly to combine that vision with this world is unclear. "We are a left-wing socialist party on the search," said Lothar Bisky in an article appearing in the newsmagazine Der Spiegel. The party has yet to find a political alternative to the current system, or even a realistic platform for change today.

Working Against the System From Within?

The PDS appears to be walking a tightrope between idealism and realism. Publicly, the party tries to promote its dedication to a program of radical change--it is a party protesting against the current social system. At the same time, attempts at new visions have been hindered by internal differences and unclear goals.

In many ways, the situation that Bundestag member Heym found himself in mirrors that of the PDS as a whole: whether to stand up against the establishment in protest for an ideal, or to work from within, seeking the power needed in order to change the system gradually. Heym chose protest over compromise. The PDS has set out in the same direction, but as other left-wing parties co-opt its most popular themes, the promise of this protest seems to dwindle. Even the leaders of the PDS cannot have failed to notice that Heym's rebellion, while it met with applause at the time, has failed to resonate. It is business as usual in the Bundestag. And it will take a political party with considerable courage and a realistic political platform to change that.

Rebecca A. Neuwirth writes from Berlin, Germany.

The German Jesuits of the Old West
By Richard J. Morgan

"In this strip of land...which pretty much resembles Germany, we were practically all German missionaries. Germans almost everywhere constituted the avant-guarde or sat as lone sentries on the farthest borders where the peoples were still complete savages."
--Joseph Och, S.J., American Frontier Missionary, 1756-1765

The fact that Joseph Och was describing the Arizona-Sonora borderlands may stretch the imagination, considering that much of the region falls within the Sonoran desert. But an interesting phenomenon occurs at higher elevations in this somewhat unique desert environment. South from the twin cities of Nogales, Arizona, and Nogales, Mexico, elevations reach more than 5,000 feet. Here cactus gives way to trees. In the winter and summer rainy seasons, the rolling hills are green. To the immediate east are the foothills of the Western Sierra Madre Mountains. Wooded summits offer views of verdant river valleys. Some of the landscape is much like southern Bavaria. In Och's time, the mountain foothills were largely the home of the Opata Indians, the Sonoran desert the domain of the Upper Pima peoples. The latter area, which includes southern Arizona, became known as the Upper Pimeria, or Pimeria Alta.

Beyond geographical similarities with his home land, Och's sense of an overwhelming German presence in the region at the time was not overstated. The American West of Hollywood was a 19th century phenomenon. Well over 100 years earlier, this same land was pioneered by soldiers and missionaries under the rule of Spain. Curiously, among these early adventurers were Jesuit missionaries from Germanic states.

Shortly after the discovery of the Americas, Pope Julius granted the Spanish king authority to represent him in the Americas and delegated to him the control of church administration there. Thus, the Jesuits and other missionary orders were compelled to collaborate with the Spanish Crown to bring Christianity to Native Americans and to facilitate their assimilation into Western culture.

The idea of non-Hispanic missionaries serving the advance of Spanish colonialism arose from the principle of supply and demand. Catholicism is an international religion, and Spain was the champion of Catholicism at the time. While Spain claimed broad areas of the Americas, it lacked the resources to meet with its own people the demand for missionaries in its new land possessions. At the same time, the Central European provinces of the Jesuit Order were showing a marked growth in membership and the Jesuits from the Germanic states were displaying a notable enthusiasm for missionary service.

There was no county named "Germany" during the Spanish colonial period; instead there were three Germanic empires (Prussia, Austria, and the Holy Roman Empire), which collectively occupied the bulk of Central and Eastern Europe. Many Jesuits were from the Austrian, Swiss, Bohemian, and Moravian territories of the Germanic states.

The Jesuit missionaries who traveled to the northern frontier of New Spain were heroic men--strangers to the region who, in the case of the non-Spaniards, faced a doubly difficult challenge. Besides mastering the Spanish language, they had to be able to speak with the Native Americans, not an easy task, as Joseph Och related:

In the country between Mexico and the Pimeria are thirty-two different languages and dialects, all of them classified and printed as grammars by the Jesuits for the purpose of study. Even the Pima language, in all of its difficulty, was organized by Father Jacob Sedelmayr, a Bavarian, through ten years of labor, and written into a lexicon. This was to be printed but it went up in smoke during [an] uprising... First of all, I had to master this difficult Pima language which in the absence of books or writings cost me half a year...

Moreover, the missionaries were compelled to work within a colonial framework in which they were viewed as suspect foreigners. To gain cooperation and minimize obvious differences between themselves and Spanish colonists, non-Hispanic Jesuits not only became fluent in Spanish but Hispanicized their names.

The first Jesuit from a Germanic state to arrive in Sonora was probably Adam Gilg, a Moravian, who began working among Sonoran coastal Indians in 1688 and an Austrian, Marc Kappus, who worked among the Opata in Cucurpe. Roughly 40 years later Germanic Jesuits began to arrive in substantial numbers. The first group consisted of the Swiss Jesuits Caspar Stieger and Phillip Segesser von Brunegg, the Austrian Johann Grazhoffer, and the Moravian Ignatius Keller. Jacob Sedelmayr arrived in 1736 to be followed by Heinrich Ruhen, Johann Nentwich, Franz Bauer, Bernhardt Middendorff, Michael Gerstner, Ignaz Pfefferkorn, and others.

The experiences of many of these men can be tracked through the lives of two: Sedelmayr, who was born near Munich, came to Sonora in 1736 at the age of 35, and Pfefferkorn, from Mannheim, arrived 15 years later at the age of 31. There are no detailed biographies of either of these men. What is known comes largely from their own writings and that of their colleagues.

Sedelmayr was selected for missionary duty in the Americas in 1735. From Germany he traveled to Cadiz, Spain, where he spent nearly a year at a Jesuit hospice used for missionaries, awaiting final trip approval and transportation to the Americas. The Spanish Crown imposed restrictions on the use of non-Hispanic missionaries in the Americas and the wait was often considerable.

Sedelmayr sailed for New Spain aboard a warship, a voyage that took roughly three months. In the harbor of Vera Cruz, the ship ran aground, short of its intended mooring site. Passengers were forced to disembark by "going over the side." Sedelmayr traveled over land to Mexico City and then onward to the northwestern frontier. In the Pimeria Alta he reported to the rectorate headquarters of San Ignacio (a rectorate was an administrative organization that consisted of several districts each with a cabecera, or headquarters mission, and vistas, or a cluster of mission stations). The rector was the Swiss Casper Stieger.

Of the first contingent of Germanic Jesuits who had come to the frontier with Stieger, Grazhoffer had died of poisoning and Segesser had been forced to leave due to illness, which left only Keller, Stieger, and the aged Spaniard Augustin Campos to serve the entire Pimeria Alta. The arrival of Sedelmayr and other fresh blood coming into the region was a great relief. Sedelmayr was assigned to the district seat of Tubutama, which was without a resident missionary.

Over the course of the following 16 years, Sedelmayr's accomplishments would be Herculean. He concentrated native populations to facilitate mission functions and attracted new people to his district. He improved existing churches and built new ones. He conducted eight major, arduous entradas (explorations) traveling by horse, mule, and foot into territories beyond the rim of colonial expansion, west to the coast and north along the Colorado River.

Early in 1751 two more Germans came to the Pimeria Alta. Johann Nentwich was assigned to Saric, about 15 miles north of Tubutama. He took the name Juan Bautista Nentvig. Heinrich Ruhen was assigned to Sonoyta, further north on the current international border. Another new arrival was Franz Bauer of Brünn, Moravia, assigned to San Xavier. (In April 1997 federal officials and local historical buffs in Arizona celebrated the incorporation of the Calabasas mission ruin into the Tumacacori National Historical Park. During the ceremony, Francisco Paver was recognized as the founder of Calabasas. Those in attendance did not find out that Paver was, in fact, Franz Bauer.)

Later in 1751, a native rebellion broke out in the Pimeria Alta. The missions at Saric, Sonoyta, and Caborca were destroyed. Nentwich barely escaped from Saric to join Sedelmayr at Tubutama. Heinrich Ruhen died at Sonoyta. Bauer was forced to flee San Xavier on foot. Meanwhile, Sedelmayr and Nentwich stood and fought along with a few Spaniards from behind improvised defenses at the Tubutama mission. Sedelmayr's church was burned down. After two days of fighting, which left both of the Jesuits wounded, they escaped, separately, by night.

The rebellion lasted less than two months, and was more of a spasm than a war. Afterwards, Sedelmayr served in other rectorates east and south of the Pimeria Alta. In between, he conducted his last, far ranging exploration, in which he probably reached the Mohave Valley, making him the first European to do so.

Meanwhile, Bauer took over at Guevavi and extended its administration to San Xavier which, after the rebellion, had been reduced to the status of visita. Bauer remained at Guevavi until 1759. During that period, San Xavier got its own resident missionary, and Bauer administered three visitas, including Tumacacori and Calabasas.

Joseph Och arrived in the Arizona-Sonora borderlands with Middendorff, Pfefferkorn, and Michael Gerstner in 1756. Within a year of Och's arrival, Bernhardt Middendorff was to establish a mission site in the vicinity of Tucson, Arizona, earning him, in the words of historian Theodore Treulein, the distinction of being "the earliest bona fide pioneer" of this major city. Few beyond a small group of scholars know of Middendorff's initiative.

The quartet of Och, Middendorff, Pfefferkorn, and Gerstner had joined forces in Würzburg, Germany. From there they had traveled to Cadiz where they spent about a year in the same hospice that Sedelmayr had known. The four sailed for Veracruz on Christmas Eve, 1755, and arrived there about one and one-half months later.

En route north from Vera Cruz, Pfefferkorn, as noted by Middendorff, the group had to overcome "many dangers from raging rivers, rough roads, precipitous mountains, and poisonous animals..." By their arrival in September 1756 in Matape, they suffered also from numerous physical maladies.

Pfefferkorn, Och, and Gerstner were eventually delayed, but Middendorff continued ahead, having received a temporary assignment as chaplain to a Spanish expeditionary force. When the other three reached the Pimeria Alta, they reported to Stieger at San Ignacio. Och would remain as Stieger's assistant. Pfefferkorn was assigned to Atil, and Gerstner to Nentwich's old mission at Saric.

Interestingly, Middendorff had already reached Saric by a very indirect route. He had arrived at the location of Tucson with a group of Spanish soldiers and stayed on alone to establish a mission there, encountering numerous difficulties.

After four months, hostile Indians drove Middendorff away. He then went to Saric but a bad fever forced him to leave there as well. Gerstner became his replacement. Middendorff was to recover, but he never returned to the northern frontier. Gerstner would serve at Saric until 1760 when Bauer was appointed rector of the Pimeria Alta, replacing Stieger at San Ignacio. Gerstner then replaced Bauer at Guevavi.

Meanwhile, Pfefferkorn faced a monumental challenge at Atil as the location had never been more than a visita. He arrived escorted by Spanish soldiers, but he sent them away when their presence frightened the natives. He then set about the task of building an active mission. In 1761 he was reassigned to Guevavi, replacing Gerstner, who returned to Saric. Pfefferkorn spent two years at Guevavi before being reassigned to Cucurpe, where he remained until 1767.

In 1763 Sedelmayr was reassigned from missionary duty to become a professor at the Jesuit college in Matape, Sonora. Over time, the Jesuits had fallen into disfavor with the Spanish Crown. Of all the missionary orders in the Americas, they had been the least compromising with the political and economic aims of the Crown. Some were even suspected of collaborating with Spain's enemies. Their good work ended in 1767, when the king ordered their expulsion from the Americas, and their status was reduced to that of criminal suspects.

The German Jesuits were marched under guard to the port of Guaymas where they were confined for months. Next came a trying voyage on the Gulf of California, an arduous march across Mexico to the east coast, and a stressful voyage across the Atlantic. Some of the Jesuits did not survive. The expulsion journey was especially difficult for Och, who by that time had become severely crippled by arthritis. Och's description of his return to Germany is especially poignant.

I arrived happily at Wirzburg (sic) after more than twenty-two hundred hours of travel on water and more than eight hundred hours on land, crippled and lame, without having set foot on the ground for more than three years. I cannot thank God enough for my safe arrival, because eighteen of my brother missionaries, all hale and hearty and in the best years of their manhood, died on the voyage in different ships and were buried at sea.

Och died six years later at the age of 48 in 1773, the same year that Pope Clement terminated the Jesuits. Most of the other expulsion survivors were interned for indefinite periods in Spain. Sedelmayr was confined at Aldea de Avila, Spain. He died there nine years later at the age of 76. Pfefferkorn and some of the others fared better.

Pfefferkorn was confined to an abbotry in Ciudad Rodrigo. Middendorff managed to win his own release. Upon returning to Germany, he contacted Pfefferkorn's sister, advising her of her brother's circumstances. She wrote a letter to the Elector of Cologne, seeking his intercession. The Elector sent a letter to the King of Spain requesting Pfefferkorn's release. In 1777, at the age of 52 years, Pfefferkorn obtained his freedom.

After his release, Pfefferkorn wrote a book on his observations and experiences on the American frontier. It incorporated information Sedelmayr provided. Entitled "A Description of the Province of Sonora," the work was originally published in two volumes. Today considered a classic in its field, it has been republished in English and Spanish as well as in German. In the book, Pfefferkorn compares the land and its products to his German homeland.

Barley is, indeed, not as plenteous in Sonora as is wheat. Still the yield is much greater than it ever is in Germany.... Also many European garden plants are far better here than they are in Germany. I saw radishes which weighed over twenty pounds....

Pfefferkorn's curiosity extended to the detailed study of how natives processed plants unique to their land. He devoted a full chapter to healing herbs and plants. Among his accounts is a description of the distillation of the liquor today known as tequila. He carries the reader through a step-by-step instruction that begins with the preparation of a stone-lined pit and the roasting of the roots of the mescal plant.

Pleasant spirits are...distilled from the root [of mescal]. These excel the best so-called Rossoli and, besides strengthening the stomach, stimulate the appetite and are very good for the digestion.... This drink can be considered a real healing remedy if it is used moderately and only according to the needs of the health.

One can well imagine that even the hardiest and most devout of these missionaries could find some merit in the moderate use of such a "remedy." After all, it would be long after the departure of the Jesuits that the influence of German braumeisters would reach the region.

Writer and Historian Richard J. Morgan conducts his research from his base in Tucson, Arizona.

Touring in the Arizona-Sonora borderlands is best after August and before June. This year on November 15, the Arizona Historical Society, the German Heritage Club, and the University of Arizona Latin American Area Center will cosponsor the first-ever celebration of the contribution of German Jesuits to the development of this region. Tours to the mission sites are now also being offered. For more information, contact the Historical Society's public information officer, Elizabeth Burden, at Tel.: (502) 617-1144 or Richard Morgan at E-mail: adined@aol.com

--Richard J. Morgan

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