RELIGION-MEXICO: Bishop Defies Vatican Orders

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Felipe Vazquez

MEXICO CITY, Oct 7 1998 (IPS) - The Papal Nuncio in Mexico, Justo Mullor, faced a first crisis after 18 months in his position here Wednesday when the Bishop of Tehuantepec, Arturo Lona Reyes, refused to give up his diocese after working there for 27 years.

Lona Reyes, identified with the Liberation Theology current, decvlared the Vatican’s representative had been manipulated by political pressures from elements opposed to his work with the poor, and his criticism of neoliberal economic policies.

Liberation Theology combines theocratic socialism and the tenets of Catholicism to free the social underclass from opression – sometimes running against the grain of the Church establishment.

Mexico has been a secular state since 1821, when then president Benito Juarez implemented laws annulling the privileges offered the Catholic Church, confiscating its assets. In 1997, diplomatic relations were restored with the Vatican by president Carlos Salinas.

“I am with the poorest of the poor and they accuse me of dividing the Church…I have never supported neoliberalism and I prefer the poor, those excluded from the system,” said Lona Reyes.

The controversial bishop said Mullor called him to his office in the Mexican capital on September 21 to request his verbal resignation, which he refused to give. According to Canon law, the Bishop must either resign or be removed from his post when he is 75 years-old, which in this case will be in the year 2000.

The Bishop explained he has already been in the Vatican bad books in the past. In 1986 he had to travel to Rome to clarify an accusation against then papal nuncio, Jeronimo Prigione, who state Lona Reyes had not sent any reports back to the Holy See since 1971.

During his 19 years in Mexico, which ended in 1997, Prigione managed to get the Vatican to replace 86 of the nearly 100 bishops in the country.

“I have been putting up with humilliating behaviour from these people for 27 years, then they suddenly requested my resignation, but I did not agree. I will not resign. It would be like betraying my people, the priest and nuns, the women, men, young people and children,” he said.

However, he did say he would resign if asked to do so by Pope John Paul II in the presence of two witnesses, as specified in the laws of the Catholic Church.

Political analysts consider Mullor’s request was basically a condemnation of Lona Reyes’ “preference” for the poor of his diocese, located in one of the poorest regions of Mexico with a mainly indigenous population. Tehuantepec, Oaxaca state, lies some 1,300 kilometres southeast of the capital, and is home to ethnic groups including the Huave, Zapoteca, Chontal Chinanteca, Mixe and Zoque peoples.

The Bishop himself attributed the request to his opposition to the government’s neoliberal policies and their imposition of projects undermining or attacking the sovereignty of indigenous cultures.

Lona Reyes stated his 27 year long ecclesiastical career had been peppered with pressurisation and even murder attempts due to his close links with indigenous and poor communities.

In protest, the Bishop launched a hunger strike accompanied by dozens of supporters in several of Tehuantepec’s churches. Meanwhile, archbishop emeritus of Oaxaca, Bartolome Carrasco, called on all members of the Mexican Bishopric to support Lona Reyes, backing his fight to remain in his post.

Carrasco said the pressure exerted on Lona Reyes represented an attempt to tuen back the clock to the times when the Church was a purely hierarchical institution with no participation.

Archbishop Sergio Obeso Rivera, former chair of Mexico’s Episcopal Conference, lamented the situation facing Lona Reyes, but called for calm and reflection in order to avoid further dividing the Church in this country.

Mullor, meanwhile, refused to comment on the storm he unleashed.