Mission Nuestra Señora del Espíritu Santo de Zúñiga, also known as Aranama Mission or Mission La Bahía, is a Catholic mission that the Spanish established in 1722 near Goliad, Texas.

The mission was first built on Matagorda Bay near what is today Houston, Texas. The Karankawa Indians once inhabited this area and first encountered Europeans when Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca and his men were shipwrecked on the Gulf Coast. A century and a half later, the French, led by Robert le Cavelier, sieur de La Salle, established the small Fort Saint Louis settlement on the coast of Matagorda Bay in 1685. However, the Karankawa attacked and destroyed it around 1689, and the French abandoned it.

The Spanish built an outpost on top of the ill-fated French settlement in 1718. The fort constructed there in 1722 became Presidio La Bahia, which protected the Mission Espíritu Santo de Zuniga. The purpose of the mission, along with its military fortress, was to secure the Texas coastline from the French and to Christianize the native Karankawa Indians. The Franciscan priests also tried to gather the local Coco, Copane, and Cujane Indians. Like the French settlement at Matagorda Bay, the Spanish fort and mission there did not last long, failing to grow crops and attract the local people to convert.

As a result, the mission was moved in 1726 near present-day Victoria, Texas, where the Tamique and Aranama peoples lived. There, they built dams and stone acequias to carry water from the Guadalupe River to the mission, and they constructed a presidio. A ranching outpost was also built of mortar and stone at Tonkawa Bank, about 12 miles below the mission on the river. Producing enough grain and hay to trade with other Spanish settlements, this site lasted for 26 years. Although prosperous, Spanish officials recommended moving the mission to secure the area between Bexar and East Texas from French and English encroachment.

The mission remained in service until Mexican Independence in 1821. However, two Franciscans refused to leave and remained as parish priests. By the 1830s, most of the Christianized Indians had left, and the mission was facing opposition from raiding Apache and Comanche. These conditions, coupled with a lack of money and political turmoil in Texas, forced the mission to close in 1830.

With most Indians already gone, local Mexican and American colonists acquired the mission’s prime lands. The mission itself became part of the City of Goliad, and the old mission stones were removed and used for local construction. The city leased the site between 1848 and 1856, first for a Baptist school and then a Presbyterian school, but the building gradually fell into ruin.

The mission ruins became part of the newly created Goliad State Park in 1931. In 1933, the Civil Works Administration, with funds provided by the Works Progress Administration, began reconstructing the stone chapel and granary, which were completed in 1941. Additional construction in the 1960s and 1980s restored the mission to its 1749 appearance. During the 1970s, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department rehabilitated the chapel and built exhibits in the restored granary.

The mission was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977 and is currently part of a state park operated by the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.