LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Casas: Spain
built 479 days ago
Lorenzo’s holiday lets and rental houses - Las Casas de Lorenzo - are self-catering vacation villas and houses in Montefrio, a white village of southern Spain, three quarters of an hour’s drive NW of Granada and the Alhambra. These rental houses are ideally located for exploring the hill towns and countryside of eastern Andalusia, as well as Granada, Cordoba, Ronda, Malaga and the villages of the Alpujarra.
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Over the following decades Las Casas ceaselessly promulgated an ideological position that Indians had the right to their land and that papal grants to Spain were for the conversion of souls, not the appropriation of resources. Developing into a politically astute lobbyist, he was often able to effect positive change, such as insuring a peaceful entry into Guatemala by Dominican friars. During 1544 he was named bishop of Chiapas in Guatemala to enforce the "New Laws" of Emperor Charles V (ruled 1519–1556), which prohibited slavery and limited ownership of Indians to a single generation. The settlers objected to any limits, and many clergy would not follow the new bishop's lead. After the king rescinded the prohibition on inheritance, Las Casas resigned his office in 1547 and returned to Spain.
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In 1516 Las Casas returned to Spain to plead the Indians' case with King Ferdinand V. On arrival, he learned that the king had died and that his grandson and successor, Charles V, was out of the country. Fortunately, he found an ally in the regent, Cardinal Francisco Jiménez y Cisneros. Jiménez named him "Protector of the Indies" and, in 1520, authorized him to found a model colony in Santo Domingo. That the effort failed was hardly the fault of Las Casas. The Indians in the designated area, who had been feuding with the Spanish settlers, found themselves the target of a punitive expedition that arrived at the same time as Las Casas. Discouraged, he took refuge in a monastery run by Dominicans, an order he eventually joined.
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Las Casas returned to Spain to plead the Indians' cause before King Ferdinand II (ruled 1479–1516). With the support of the archbishop of Toledo, Las Casas was named priest-procurator of the Indies in 1516. He returned to the Western Hemisphere as a member of a commission of investigation. During 1520 he developed an alternative to the encomienda system in Venezuela with a colony of farm communities. After the failure of this idealistic scheme to get Spanish farmers to work alongside free natives, Las Casas joined the Dominican order in Santo Domingo during 1522.
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In becoming a priest Las Casas gained two important points: almost complete freedom of speech and material independence. As an ecclesiastic he could penetrate nearly everywhere, and express himself as he liked. The rapid disappearance of the Indians in the Antilles caused much concern in Spain. Fears were entertained that it would ruin the colonies. Las Casas proposed a remedy. He suggested and, with characteristic vehemence, insisted that the natives should be placed under the control of the Church, and separated from contact with any portion of the laity.
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In 1543, with court officials in Spain eager to be rid of him, Las Casas was named bishop of the impoverished region of Chiapas in southern Mexico. There he immediately alienated his flock by refusing absolution to any Spaniard who would not free his Indian slaves. He was denounced to the Spanish court as a "lunatic" and received numerous death threats. Eventually he resigned his bishopric and returned to Spain, where he felt he could more effectively prosecute his cause. There he died on July 18, 1566, at the age of eighty-two.
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