Petition started to keep holiday theatre performances at San Juan Bautista Mission

The popular theater company El Teatro Campesino announced the annual presentations of “La Virgen del Tepeyac” and “La Pastorela” at Old Mission San Juan Bautista have been essentially forced out.

For 48 years El Teatro Campesino has held performances representing rich Chicano culture unlike anywhere on the central coast, according to fans.

“It’s just a really magical thing that I think everyone should experience,” Salinas resident Claudia Melendez Salinas said.

“A view that people don’t see all the time. It’s very wholesome,” San Juan Bautista resident Joaquin Vasquez says.

The theater inside the Mission has been terminated by the permanent installation of pews, which the fire Marshall required for safety reason.

Shortly after the Chicano theater company announced they will have to stop their holiday performances at the mission, Melendez Salinas started a petition that’s already gathered about 200 signatures.

“The Virgen de Guadalupe who was dark skinned, who spoke indigenous language, but who was European of ancestry made us feel we are welcome in this religion. Made us feel we are welcome in this new world,” Melendez said.

Melendez says part of the spirit of the play is inside the historic walls of the mission.

“If we lose that especially at the mission it would be a great loss to the community,” she said.

Melendez Salinas is asking for the diocese to find some sort of resolution that would make it possible for the performances to stay at the holy mission.

“We’re talking about an institution that has built cathedrals throughout the world I believe that taking pews off a mission should be a piece of cake for them,” she says.

The Diocese of Monterey is aware of the petition, but they say unfortunately there was no choice but to install the pews.

The theater company, determined to keep their performances alive, plans to move the play to their playhouse this winter, which is also in San Juan Bautista.