Susana Baca serenades Pope Leo XIV upon his arrival in Peru
Susana Baca, the Latin Grammy-winning Afro-Peruvian singer, serenaded Pope Leo XIV when he arrived in Peru — an arrival expected to draw attention to the culture that grew out of the African slave trade in the country. Baca was also Peru’s first Black Cabinet minister, and she became a leading figure in the campaign to end the discrimination that has long made second-class citizens of Black Peruvians and Peru’s Indigenous peoples.
Baca told The Associated Press that she felt connected to the pope because of the importance he has placed in asking forgiveness for injustices.
“I believe that one of the most important things in the history of Afro-Peruvians is that we did not remain submerged despite our history of suffering,” she said. “We are an Afro-Peruvian people who have learned to forgive.”
“And perhaps this is what connects me, in my conscience, to the pope. I feel that in all his homilies and teachings, the pope emphasizes the importance of asking for forgiveness and forgiving — that the injustices of many moments in history are less painful if we have the capacity to forgive and to be forgiven.”
Baca said she chose to sing “Canción de Fe” (“Song of Faith”) and “Si me quitaran totalmente todo” (“If Everything Were Taken From Me”) to the pope because the songs embody the same notion of faith that Leo shares.
Leo, who was born in the United States and whose own family tree includes enslaved people and slave owners, is expected to highlight Peru’s African-descended community on Saturday when he visits Zaña, the hub of Afro-Peruvian culture. He will lead a prayer meeting at the sanctuary of St. Turibius of Mogrovejo in Zaña, where he often visited to pray while he was bishop of nearby Chiclayo.
Mogrovejo was the first archbishop of Lima in the 16th century. He defended the rights of Indigenous and enslaved people and was known for having confirmed St. Martin de Porres, the first Black saint of the Americas and the patron saint of racial harmony, social justice and people of multiracial backgrounds.
Leo issued an apology for slavery in his first encyclical, “Magnificent Humanity,” addressing the role of past popes in legitimizing slavery and failing to condemn it for centuries. The apology referred to a series of 15th-century directives from the Vatican that authorized European sovereigns to conquer Africa and the Americas and enslave non-Christians.
“It is impossible not to feel deep sorrow when contemplating the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many in stark contrast to their immeasurable dignity as persons infinitely loved by the Lord,” Leo wrote. “For this, in the name of the church, I sincerely ask for pardon.”
An estimated 100,000 African slaves were brought to Peru after the arrival of Spanish conquistadores. They toiled in sugar plantations and silver mines, and some became urban artisans. At one point, they and their descendants made up more than 40% of Lima’s population. Black people now are a small fraction of Peru’s 35 million people, and they have struggled to advance in the more than 170 years since emancipation.
The national census in 2017 reported that 1,311 people residing in Zaña identify as Afro-Peruvian. In the entire Lambayeque region, the figure was 78,639.
Zaña, a historic town of northern Peru located in the Chiclayo province, was recognized by UNESCO in 2017 as a “site of memory of slavery and African cultural heritage.” Peru’s government says the recognition is the first of its kind granted to a Peruvian Afro-descendant community or comparable communities along South America’s Pacific Coast.
“There are communities capable of withstanding any blow — even seven ‘El Niño’ weather phenomena, or the even harsher, more perverse blows dealt by the darkest side of humanity, such as slavery,” former Culture Minister Salvador del Solar said during a ceremony in Zaña’s main square.
“Communities like Zaña can truly say that no blow has ever been strong enough to break them completely; they continue to reaffirm their Afro-descendant identity with pride,” del Solar said.
The Afro-descendant community is celebrating the return of Leo, their former bishop, and is particularly proud of Baca’s performance before the first pope with Black roots.
“I’m so proud to see an Afro-Peruvian person singing to the pope, and to know that Black blood courses through his veins,” said Felipe Gutierrez, a local chef and a poet known as Frontado.
“That the pope has Afro-descendant blood is also a source of pride for Zaña because Zaña identifies with the Afros,” said Gutierrez, who writes and improvises the Peruvian art form known as “decimas.”
All four of Leo’s maternal great-grandparents were “free people of color” in Louisiana, according to 19th-century census records. As part of the melting pot of French, Spanish, African and Native American cultures in Louisiana, the pope’s maternal ancestors would be considered Creole.
Zaña is home to an Afro-Peruvian museum whose collection includes historical photographs, plantation carts and percussion musical instruments of African origin from Peru, Cuba and Brazil. The museum also stores documents of enslaved people and some of the shackles used to restrain them.
One of the museum’s walls has photos of Leo from visits to the town when he was bishop. There are also large framed photographs of Barack Obama, the first Black president of the United States, and of South African anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela.
“We pay homage to them here in Zaña,” Gutierrez said during a recent visit to the museum, where he wore a Chicago Bulls shirt with Michael Jordan’s number 23 on the back. Chicago is where Leo was born.
“They show us how someone who is Black as we are in Zaña became a president and we’re proud because we all deserve the same rights,” Gutierrez said. “Black, Indigenous, all of us are equal in the eyes of God.”
Winfield contributed from Chiclayo, Peru.
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