The night of the bucolic baptism

Abstract

This is a historical-sociological short story that seeks to rescue magical realism. Set in the 1970s, it tells the story of a doctor who arrives in a town in Michoacán called "Colinda" as part of his social service. Upon his arrival, he is welcomed by an elderly woman who gradually introduces him to the town’s dynamics and leads him to meet the highest authority of the ranch: the priest. Meanwhile, the story focuses on the town's imaginaries, traditional morality, and the concepts of courage, religion, and brutality. Finally, in the last part of the story, an unexpected situation occurs once the protagonist goes to sleep: a liturgical scene in the middle of the night, full of symbolism that alludes not only to Christian religious figures but also to the synthesis of pre-Columbian cultures (the Purépecha) that resulted from the conquest.