In November 2024, the main temple of the religious organisation La Luz del Mundo in Guadalajara was added to the Mexican state of Jalisco’s inventory of heritage sites. The decision to list the Mexican architect Leopoldo Fernández Font’s massive 1992 building immediately sparked controversy, but the row has little to do with the temple’s bold design. Naasón Joaquín García, La Luz del Mundo’s leader since 2014, is currently serving a 16-year sentence in California for sexually abusing children. This fact sparked an ongoing debate about how much a site’s conflicted history should influence heritage considerations.
Symbolism and scale
At 83m high, La Luz del Mundo’s main temple is visible from much of Guadalajara. It stands at the heart of the neighbourhood of La Hermosa Provincia, which the congregation built for its followers in the early 1950s.
La Luz del Mundo was founded in the city in 1926 by Eusebio Joaquín González (known as Aaron). The autonomous church follows Evangelical beliefs closely related to Pentecostalism and considers its leader—a lifelong “living apostle”—to be God’s representative on Earth. Leadership is rooted in familial connections, with Naasón Joaquín as its third apostle.
La Luz del Mundo set out to build a temple that would dwarf Guadalajara Cathedral
In the early 1980s, the economically buoyant and fast-growing congregation (then led by Naasón Joaquín’s father, Samuel Joaquín Flores) set out to build a new temple that would dwarf Guadalajara Cathedral, a symbol of Catholicism in a traditionally conservative region. Fernández Font—who had experience building Baptist and Catholic churches, hotels and universities, mainly in Jalisco—won the contest to design the building.
“According to the jury, the project fulfilled the requirements: a structure visible from a distance, monumental and majestic, with a naturally ventilated interior, good lighting, unobstructed visibility and, above all, ample capacity,” says Iván San Martín Córdova, an architectural researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
The result was a pyramid-like building that can hold 12,000 worshippers. Constructed by hundreds of church volunteers, it was filled with religious symbols and eventually topped by a 23m-tall bronze sculpture of the biblical Aaron’s rod. The site covers 15,500 sq. m, employing unique architectural innovations to span its large space without the use of intermediate supports, according to San Martín.
Conflicting visions
The Guadalajara temple, a community enclave and pilgrimage site, became a symbol of La Luz del Mundo, which now has a presence in 60 countries and more than 15,000 congregations worldwide, according to its website.
“Starting in the late 20th century, many of its temples re-created historical styles, such as Mayan or Mesopotamian, to demonstrate their universality, generate empathy and highlight the alleged ancient roots of a relatively recent faith,” San Martín says.
The symbolism of Guadalajara’s temple reaches even further than that, according to Enrique X. de Anda Alanís, an architecture historian and expert on Mexican heritage. “It expresses the relationship between architecture and power, both socially and within the urban landscape, as has been evident over 2,000 years,” he says.
After accusations of sexual abuse of minors, possession of child pornography and human trafficking emerged against Naasón Joaquín, images of the temple were widely publicised and the building became synonymous with the scandal. Three separate documentaries have investigated La Luz del Mundo, its leadership and the experiences of its followers. In the films, some victims describe being transported to buildings where abuse took place through the Guadalajara temple’s underground tunnels (designed to protect its leaders from unwanted attention and allow them to pass unnoticed).
La Luz del Mundo’s Guadalajara temple at night Photo: JosEnrique, via Flickr
“The temple materialises the abuse suffered by dozens of victims, as recounted in their testimonies,” says Alejandro Díaz San Vicente, the director of the 2023 miniseries El Apóstol. In the late 1990s, Samuel Joaquín had also faced allegations of sexual abuse, albeit with no repercussions; he died in 2014.
When news of the heritage listing surfaced, it caused a media uproar. In response, local authorities declared that the listing represented only an “effort to promote [the temple’s] safeguarding and subject future interventions to official review”, rather than designating it as part of the official cultural heritage of the state.
“The church is an example of modern or international architecture from the 1980s, designed by renowned architect Fernández Font, who created an original and timeless project that serves as a community landmark and identifier,” Jalisco’s cultural ministry said in a statement in March. The ministry has not commented on the matter since then.
The building’s cultural designation also plays into local politics. Historically, La Luz del Mundo has been tied to government officials, sparking debate over the years. De Anda calls the temple’s heritage listing “a local phenomenon that lends a distinction to a building without federal repercussions and is part of the congregation’s network of political relationships”. For example, recent candidates for Mexico’s reformed judicial system are reportedly close to the church’s leadership.
A wider lens
While this debate has unfolded in Jalisco, it poses larger questions about heritage designation worldwide. “Heritage practice has been grappling with controversial associations with people and events for decades now, up to the highest levels, and can even be subject to diplomatic intervention,” says Luke James, an expert in international cultural heritage.
One such example is the 2015 listing of sites of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution on Unesco’s World Heritage list, which sparked Korean opposition over forced labour endured there during the Second World War. A compromise was reached when Japan acknowledged this aspect of its history in the site’s interpretation materials.
In Spain, meanwhile, last year’s local heritage recognition of the 1939 Pyramid of the Italians in Burgos, a funerary sanctuary dedicated to soldiers killed in the Spanish Civil War, became controversial for what some view as the monument’s glorification of fascism. In this case, the dispute is ongoing, and a compromise has yet to be reached.
These examples highlight heritage’s political and ideological implications, where a simple act of acknowledgment has the ability to create a middle ground. While debate is common with many heritage sites—including those associated with religious leaders of the Catholic Church and others—in La Luz del Mundo’s case, these issues are accentuated. This is likely due to its extensive media coverage, social media immediacy, pending legal proceedings in Mexico and disinformation.
Chronological proximity also plays a part. “When the events or associations are in living memory of the community, they are bound to be caught up in various interpretations and sometimes deeply affectual responses,” James says.
The fact that, as is the case with other religious minorities in Mexico, La Luz del Mundo and its aesthetic have historically been viewed by many as “the other” only adds to the equation. Whether further heritage recognition will be granted to its flagship temple remains to be seen. But in the court of public opinion, at least, it seems unlikely.
