I received this email from a player yesterday:

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Dear everyone involved,

I love the Choice-of-Games games you offer, but I’m a little irked at the blatant Catholic bashing in Choice of the Vampire. Please keep in mind that the Catholic clergy did *not* torture natives into conversion. The majority of natives who did suffer torture suffered at the hands of the Conquistadors, the men who came searching for gold and glory, while the Spanish (and French Jesuit) clergy offered protection, reading, writing, medical treatment, etc. to the displaced natives. There have even been visitations to the natives by saints, martyrs, and the Virgin Mary (the Virgin of Guadeloupe [a place in Spain, for the record] visited one native who was named a saint under Pope John Paul II, for example).

The Catholic Church has long been a refuge to displaced native peoples. In the United States (before it became the USA), more Protestants were inclined to capture or displace the Native Americans they encountered, while French traders and Jesuits were more inclined to trade with them. However, anything ugly said about such a thing in a game like Choice of the Vampire would rile up the Protestants who played.

I think it only fair that you either make it clear that this one clergyman or a small group of them were involved in torture, in spite of Church opposition (there are always sinful people in all walks of life, clergy included, and I’d be fine with that depiction), or leave it out altogether. But please, don’t color the Catholic Church as a single color of violence, particularly in an era and area where the Church strove to protect the native people from oppression.
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When I asked the player if I could post this email to the blog, so that the matter could be discussed with the community at large, I received this response.

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Having played the game through several times, I admit that my reaction was knee-jerk. Overall, the story is positive and not negative toward religion; rather, it’s the way the characters respond to your choices that can be negative or positive, and that is perfectly acceptable. I’m still a little upset that the priest character involved resorted to torture, but as I said before, evil men are everywhere, including in the clergy, and they will do negative things. Overall, I do feel this was fairly presented and thank you for taking the time to read my email.

BTW – I *adore* Choice Of Games, and will continue to play them.
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I assume that the “knee-jerk” reaction was to this line: “This priest of the Spanish Main, accustomed as he was to arduous task of torturing native peoples until they converted to the One True Church, found himself discomforted by the den of vicious iniquity that is New Orleans.”

You can reach this line by selecting Padre Carlos as your maker, and then selecting ‘need’ as the reason for your recruitment.

I very much appreciate the fact that the concerned player gave the game another chance, and played it through several more times, enough to change their opinion and conclude that I was not specifically bashing Catholicism.

I will admit, however, that the player’s concerns caught me by surprise. I anticipated criticism for my handling of race, or of homosexual relationships, or of gender, or even for skirting the edge of implied pedophilia. And so, I was actually unprepared to defend the description of Padre Carlos as a torturer. Being a Spanish priest active in the Caribbean, I assumed that allusions to the Inquisition would explain this point without trouble.

After doing some research this morning, I found two Wikipedia entries regarding outstanding priests in the Spanish Main. Bartolomé de las Casas was a Dominican priest who later became bishop of Chiapas. He is lauded for his conversion of opinion. Originally a participant in the Encomienda system, he experienced a change of heart, and became one of its greatest detractors, traveling to Spain to lobby the king to improve the treatment of the Native Americans. What I conclude from these and several other fragmentary Wikipedia entries, he succeded in getting the New Laws passed in 1542. Unfortunately, because of the danger these laws posed to the New World establishment, there was an open revolt against these laws, and they were more or less repealed. However, the spirit of these reforms did not die, and in 1573 the Laws of the Indies were passed, and progressively implemented over the next thirty years, thereby converting the Encomienda system to the Repartimiento one.

In contradistinction to Casas, there was Diego de Landa, who very nearly destroyed any chance of us ever deciphering the Mayan syllabary by systematically destroying codices and cultural artifacts, and who openly and unrepentantly tortured native “idolators.” Interestingly, some argue that it was Landa’s very enthusiasm for torture that resulted in the removal of the Franciscan authority to discipline the natives (but only after Landa’s death).

But that is only a cursory examination. Most of my research was directed towards other topics.

That said, I hope that it is clear that I had not intended to single out Catholicism for disparagement. In my opinion, the Catholic church is made up of individuals. Some of those individuals are Casas, some of the are Landas, but most are just people.

Padre Carlos is meant as a specific type of vampire, one who already had a grossly distorted theology as a mortal, and who has reconciled his transformation and mortal beliefs with his new condition by becoming even more demented.

Faith has a very complex role in the game. I don’t want to say too much, because I don’t want to give away certain things at the moment. However, I hope it’s clear that I am not trying to cast Padre Carlos as emblematic of the Catholic Church or its priests as a whole.