355
Tlie Agony of tlie Clttwch in Texas, I82I-I836
In 1834 Bishop Belaunzaran y Urena had a serious misunderstanding with the State officials of Nuevo Leon and was obliged to flee his Diocese in disguise. Musquiz was warned from Monclova to keep a close watch for the prelate. Padilla wrote him that the Bishop had been exiled from Monterrey and that it was thought he would take refuge either in Coahuila or Texas. But Texas had more weighty matters to bewail. A serious epidemic of smallpox had swept through and practically decimated the population; torrential rains flooded the country; and malaria attacked the weakened survivors. Politics were forgotten for the time being. An order was issued against ringing the bells of San Fernando and the missions in San Antonio that their plaintive notes might not add to the gloom and depression brought on by the numerous deaths. 114 With the Shepherd of the flock persecuted, the bells silenced, the blood of the last Franciscan missionary still fresh upon the banks of Sandy Creek in East Texas, and the threatening clouds of revolution ominously hover- ing on the darkening horizon, the Church lay in agony. But not for long. The Church in Texas was destined to rise gloriously and flourish again in the cheerful sunlight of liberty and freedom. 114 J. Antonio Padilla to Jefe Politico, June 22, 1834; Juan N. Seguin to Alcalde of Bexar, October 29, 1834, Bexar .A,-c/,ives.
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