The state of spiritual siege described in the previous chapters and experienced by Christian communities throughout the period in question was, as we have seen, exacerbated in the viceroyalty by the foundation of new Christian municipalities in what was hitherto pagan territory. In effect, these foundations served as bridgeheads into territory held by Satan, from which missionaries might sally forth to spread the gospel in accordance with New Testament instruction. As with the Erasmian Christological schema described in chapter 1, these newly founded Christian centres, in theory, would act as focal points from which Christianity might radiate outwards in concentric circles, turning souls towards God and removing them from the devil's clutches.

In order to do this, it was necessary for missionaries to convince indigenous Andeans of the truth of their message: that the Christian God was the only god and that all other gods were false, either erroneously conceived or diabolically inspired. To persuade Andeans that their gods, the apus and the huacas, were diabolical first necessitated that the Christian priests convince them of the existence and nature of the devil. As such, Christianity could not generally be presented to Andeans without also setting in motion a process of demonization of the indigenous gods. This created the paradox that in order to cast out Satan from the Andes, the Spanish missionaries first had to cause his conceptual genesis in the minds of Andeans.

Despite initial setbacks caused by the lack of missionaries and years of chaos and civil war following the conquest, it seemed as if progress was being made. Indians were being baptized. After all, the conquest itself had demonstrated the power of the Christian god over indigenous deities. However, as realization dawned that the Christian god and his saints were not merely to be assimilated into the indigenous pantheon but to replace it entirely, resistance to the Tridentine evangelization process appeared to grow.