Bernardino de Cárdenas

Bernardino de Cárdenas y Ponce, O.F.M., (1579?–1668 ) was a friar of the Franciscan order and Bishop of Asunción and later Santa Cruz de la Sierra. He served as Governor of Paraguay from March 4, 1649 – October 1, 1649. He ordered the first expulsion of the Jesuits from the Governorate of Paraguay, although this expulsion did not last; he was deposed as governor following a battle against the Jesuit armies.

Early life He was born Cristóbal de Cárdenas in La Paz, Upper Peru. He studied theology at the Jesuit College of San Martin in Lima, and changed his given name to Bernardino upon joining the Franciscan order. Cárdenas served at the Convent of Chuquisaca in 1614–1620 and as a missionary among the Quechua Indians in 1621–1627, and traveled through both Upper and Lower Peru.

Feud with Governor Hinestrosa Cárdenas arrived in Asunción, the same year as the new governor, Gregorio de Hinestrosa. Both men were proud, and a feud for power developed between the two. The feud eventually expanded to include the Jesuit Fathers as well, who managed the nearby Jesuit Reductions. While Cárdenas spoke warmly of the Jesuits at first, praising them in a letter written in 1643, the Jesuits eventually backed Hinestrosa, an open admirer of the Jesuits, in the political struggle between the governor and the bishop. ) The two sides met in a brief battle on October 5, 1649, in which the Paraguayans lost in a complete defeat. Twenty-two settlers died and many more were wounded. Cárdenas was imprisoned by León y Zárate, and the citizens of Asunción suffered what to them was the humiliating spectacle of an occupying army of Indians. Cárdenas was eventually exiled from Paraguay and sent to Charcas in Upper Peru.

Luckily for Cárdenas, in the time he was held at Charcas, the Jesuits' fortunes were on the decline in the royal courts of Madrid after the Jesuits had supported the independence of Portugal from Spain. Cárdenas was reprimanded for accepting the result of the election based on the old decree and for expelling the Jesuits without royal permission, but received no further punishment. He was restored to his post as Bishop of Asunción in 1660; after he claimed he was too old and ill to make the journey back to Paraguay, he was made Bishop of Santa Cruz de la Sierra instead, in Upper Peru. Cárdenas died in Arani on October 20, 1668.