Teresa Urrea, often referred to as Teresita and also known as Santa Teresa or La Santa de Cábora (the "Saint of Cabora") among the Mayo (October 15, 1873 – January 11, 1906), was a Mexican mystic, folk healer, and revolutionary insurgent.
Early life
Urrea was born in 1873 in Ocoroni, Sinaloa. Her father, Tomás Urrea, was from Álamos, Sonora and owned a "rancho" in Cábora, to the northeast of Álamos. Her mother, Cayetana Chávez, was an indigenous 14-year-old ranch hand from Tehueco. Throughout her early life, which was spent in Cábora and nearby Aquihuiquichi, her father largely ignored her, and she was raised by her bitter aunt and quiet mother.
Folk icon
In the fall of 1889 Urrea had a serious illness and began to experience religious visions. When she recovered she believed she had been given healing powers by the Virgin Mary, and she soon gained a following when 1200 people camped nearby to seek healing and observe miracles. Indigenous people began to call her "The Saint of Cabora". She drew criticism from church officials for giving informal sermons in which she drew attention to clerical abuses. It was reported in the church that she was "always friendly with the sick, especially with the poor, without ever getting angry, demonstrating an exemplary humility. A heroic, she is without rest from dawn until sometimes late at night, and caters patiently and personally with the angry, touching with her hands the most nasty sores, making her bed alongside some patients who suffered from infectious diseases such as phthisis, lazarinos [leprosy], and others." The Mexican press began to cover her activities in December 1889, notably the newspaper El Monitor Republicano of Mexico City.
Urrea predicted an impending flood that would destroy all places except a few she designated. One of the designated places was Jambiobampo, Sonora which was the center of preaching by Damian Quijano, a Mayo inspired by Urrea's teaching whose father had been a general under Cajemé warring against the Mexicans.
Urrea was venerated as a folk saint among the Yaqui and Mayo peoples, who are indigenous to the Sonoran Desert near the United States border. A drought in the states of Chihuahua and Sonora, along with economic and political instability, led the village of Tomochic, Chihuahua to seek her guidance. A violent confrontation occurred there between villagers and government authorities on December 7, 1891. A second village revolt on December 26 routed forty soldiers, and Urrea left the area to avoid being blamed for the incidents. Nonetheless, the government held her responsible and exiled Urrea and her father in May 1892. They settled in Nogales, Arizona. The Tomochitecos, however, continued their armed resistance against the government in her name. In response, government troops razed Tomochic in October 1892, and 300 villagers had died in the struggle by the end of that year. Some modern sources credit Urrea for the religious fervor with which the outnumbered Tomochitecos resisted government forces.
Expulsion from Mexico
Although the resistance fighters invoked Urrea's popular nickname, "Santa de Cabora", and sought her help, there is no direct evidence that she took part in their activities. Her popularity among insurgents appears to have been due to amateur sermons she had made about equality, justice, and brotherly love. Some sources assert that "she also made speeches inciting the people to fight for their land". Her extradition was undertaken as a military action by the Eleventh Regiment and the Twelfth Battalion of the Mexican army under General Abraham Bandala. The Urrea family departed without incident, but General Bandala reported to the Secretary of War that there was a risk of uprisings among the Mayo people due to Urrea's influence. Indigenous Mayos invoked her name when they attacked the city of Navojoa in Sonora in retaliation for the seizure of their lands.
Urrea's arrival in Nogales received a hero's welcome. A crowd greeted her at the train station and local police escorted her to a hotel. Urrea and her father applied for United States citizenship soon afterward, although no record exists that either of them were granted it. Urrea spent the next three years living in a small community near Nogales where she resumed her folk healing.