I have been interested in the New Mexican mission in Acoma a long time and shall return later to it and the Spanish missions in New Mexico. However I want to start with the nearby Church in Laguna. The Pueblo revolt by Native Americans of 1680 was very distructive to the whole area but after the Spanish Reconquest an offshoot of Acoma was established - a new pueblo village some 30 miles away at Laguna in the late 1690s. Settlers from Acoma and Zuni and Queres helped to found it. Like Acoma, it is situated on an outcrop of rock, rising like an island in the land. The houses today still show a fascinating blend of Indian and Spanish architecture. The highest point was used to found the Church of San Jose. much of it built by the local people while they welcomed their first Priest, Fray Antonio de Miranda. Unusually the building is of stone covered by adobe and now regularly whitewashed.
The interior is 105 by 22 feet There were no arches or dome; as these were quite unknown to Native Americans and they did the building... Kubler 'Art and Architecture in Spain and Portugal and their American dominions 1500-18800' waxes lyrical about the building : in particular about a transverse window spanning the nave at the chancel between the roof levels of the nave and the sanctuary thereby producing what can be called a Baroque light effect. There may have been a clerestory originally that was dispensed with when the roof was reordered at a later date. I note there are now two windows high up on the left wall of the nave and a prominent window over the entrance on the west wall and these do create some light. Nevertheless the interior was felt by Fray Dominguez to be "very gloomy" in 1776!!
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| Chncel in 1923 by Laura Gilpin : alas the side walls have since been whitewashed. |
Early in the first decade of the next century an unnamed artist, who we call "the Laguna santero" created the colourful altar screen and sanctuary we know today. It simulates the foliage and scrolls of Spanish artists. A contemporary Fray Jose Pedro Rubi de Celis Wrote "First, the church of this mission built of stone with baptistery and sacristy. At its main altar is placed a wooden altar screen painted in tempera with delicate colors. Four turned columns and three scallop shells in half relief adorn it. In the principal place it has painted an image of the Most Holy Patriarch St. Joseph, on his right side that of Lord St. John Nepomucene, on the other side that of St. Barbara, and at the summit the Most Holy Trinity. In addition to this, there is at this altar a painting on a frame fit to the shape of the sanctuary serving as a ceiling over the altar. The side walls are adorned with curtains in perspective, painted in colors, which embellish the entire sanctuary. The table that serves for celebrating [Mass] has its elk-hide frontal on very solid frames and well painted."
A painting of St Joseph still dominates the reredos. An earlier one presented to the Church in Acoma by King Charles II was for a time kept here. This caused a dispute that went on for several years which ended up in the Supreme Court in 1857.
There were adjacent buildings for a small community of friars in the 18th century. These decayed over the 19th century and were later used as community rooms until they were returned to the Church to become accomodation for the priest.
In the 1870s the church was nearly pulled down, due to lack of use and the hostility of local Protestants. The then sacristan, Hami, faced down the Protestants and through several generations the Church has survived and is still a parish church in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Gallup, and visited by tourists. Alas I doubt that I will get there....it is a special place.
For a very interesting article by Suizanne Hammons written 9 April 2014 read here.
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| "Misión San José de Laguna," in World History Commons, https://worldhistorycommons.org/mision-san-jose-de-laguna [accessed November 10, 2025 |
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