In 1958, the Bishop of San Cristóbal de las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico, asked the Jesuits to establish a mission in a remote and mountainous region of the diocese.  At that time, the region had not been served by the Catholic Church for nearly 100 years, a result of the ant-clericalism and reforms of the mid-1800s.  On a very foggy day in December of 1958, a small plane carrying a few Jesuit priests and brothers flew to the remote region, as there were no roads. They hoped to inaugurate the Jesuit Mission that day. But the weather seemed to conspire against the Jesuits' dream. Thick clouds hovered between the mountains, obscuring the view of the village below. Just as it seemed they would have to fly back, the clouds parted and the plane touched down. The Jesuit Mission of Bachajón was inaugurated on December 3, 1958, the Feast of Saint Francis Xavier, one of the founders and great missionaries of the Jesuit order.

The first Jesuit priests and brothers, and later the Sisters of the Divine Shepherd, attended the Tseltal People of the region by walking to their villages and hamlets, deep in the mountains and jungles. Most of the people spoke very little Spanish and the Jesuits and sisters spoke almost no Tseltal. Some in the Mission believed that in a matter of a few years all the Tseltales would speak Spanish and refused to learn the difficult indigenous language. But the Tseltal People had been resisting the destruction of their culture and language ever since the arrival of the Spanish. Soon the priests and sisters realized that they had much to learn from the Tseltal people, including their beautiful language. Today, the Jesuit Mission and the Center for Indigenous Rights reflect the cultural and linguistic diversity of Chiapas: the bilingual staffs are comprised of Tseltal indigenous and Spanish-speaking Mestizos, lay volunteers, and religious priests, brothers and nuns.

The Jesuit Mission attends to a population of approximately 100,000 people who live in over 550 villages and small town, in a territory of 3000 square kilometers that extends from the highlands in the mountains to the lowland jungles. The pastoral staff includes Jesuit priests, nuns, and lay workers, some with over 30 years of experience living and working among the Tseltales. All are required to learn the Tseltal language when they arrive to work in the Mission. The Mission's work includes training and education of lay leaders of the Church; translation into Spanish and Tseltal of various educational, cultural and church-related materials; integration of women in the life of the community; training and support of health promoters and midwives, including an innovative nutrition program; support of sustainable and organic cultivation practices through volunteer "Caretakers of the Earth" (jCanan Lum Qu'inal); administration of a certificate program in the Tseltal and Spanish languages and cultures; and a work-study scholarship program for Tseltal youth who wish to continue their studies beyond high school while they serve their communities.

The Center for Indigenous Rights (CEDIAC) is a nonprofit organization recognized by the United Nations as a nongovernmental human rights center. The CEDIAC staff is also bilingual, multicultural, lay and religious. CEDIAC engages in a variety of work, including investigation of human rights violations; training and education of community mediators and traditional judges; education and encouragement of communities to become involved in civic life; support and education for community-based coffee and honey cooperatives, as well as efforts to support sustainable agriculture and other economic development projects. CEDIAC also administers a "coffee school" where small-scale farmers learn about methods to cultivate shade-grown, organic gourmet coffee, quality control and strategies to sell their coffee within Mexico and in foreign markets.

To learn more, read a brief history of the conflict in Chiapas by SIPAZ, a nongovernmental organization based in Chiapas that works toward the nonviolent resolution of conflict.