El Papa Peronista (The Economist)
En el marco de la visita del Papa Francisco a Ecuador, Bolivia y Paraguay, la revista The Economist se encargó de describir el tono político de la gira del líder de la iglesia Católica en América Latina, mientras que advirtió sobre la preocupación de algunos analistas de que el Papa estuviese abusando su costado político.
http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21657401-franciss-balancing-act-latin-america-peronist-pope
IF ONE can apply the term to a 78-year-old prelate who has turned lack of ostentation into an art form, then Pope Francis is a rock star. Or at least that is how he is being greeted in Latin America this week. Hundred of thousands have turned up for open-air masses in Ecuador, with more to follow in Bolivia and Paraguay. Yet the eight-day tour—the longest foreign trip so far in this papacy and the first to Spanish-speaking America—may do more than underline the popularity in his home region of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the first Latin American pope. It may add political definition to his papacy.
Still home to 40% of the world’s Catholics, Latin America has seen a swift advance of evangelical Protestantism in the past 40 years. Yet according to the Pew Research Centre, a think-tank in the United States, Paraguay (where 89% are Catholics), Ecuador (79%) and Bolivia (77%) remain bastions of the faith, along with Colombia and Mexico.
The pope’s most obvious purpose is to keep them that way by making the church more welcoming and more relevant. In Guayaquil, in Ecuador, in a mass celebrating the family (“the best social capital”) he spoke of his concern for those excluded from it—a reference to the quiet battle he is waging for more tolerance towards gay couples and divorcees. The issue will be taken up by a synod in October.
The three countries he is visiting are all fairly small and poor, with large Amerindian populations. They were chosen carefully. Francis, who used to be a Jesuit priest in Argentina, values pastoral work with those on the margins of society, respects popular piety and promises a “poor church, for the poor”.
His words have enthused supporters of liberation theology, a set of leftist ideas that were influential in Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s. Francis speeded up the beatification, which took place in May, of Óscar Romero, a Salvadorean archbishop who was gunned down by a right-wing death squad while celebrating mass in 1980 and is a hero to the left.
Yet Father Bergoglio always rejected Marxism and violent revolution, which some leftist priests supported. Rather than embracing liberation theology, he is reinterpreting it for a post-Marxist age. Romero’s “option for the poor wasn’t ideological but evangelical,” says the Vatican. The pope’s criticisms of free-market capitalism chime both with traditional Catholic social doctrine and with Peronism, Argentina’s populist-nationalist political movement, to which he was once close.
Two of the pope’s hosts, Ecuador’s president, Rafael Correa, and Bolivia’s Evo Morales, are hard-left allies of Venezuela’s authoritarian regime. They proclaim that they will take from the rich and give to the poor, while quietly squelching the opposition. Mr Correa, who calls himself a “Christian leftist”, publicly implied this week that the pope backs his policies. In a barely veiled rebuke to his host, the pope stressed the value of pluralism and warned against “dictatorships, personality cults and the eagerness for sole leaderships”.
Francis has already shown himself to be a highly political pope. His support for the secret talks that led to a diplomatic thaw between the United States and Cuba was crucial. When embassies reopen later this month after 54 years, he can claim some of the credit. He has five times received Argentina’s president, Cristina Fernández, a Peronist with whom he clashed when archbishop of Buenos Aires.
With a presidential election in October (in which Ms Fernández herself cannot stand), those meetings have provoked grumbling from opponents. But the pope is “very subtle in exercising influence in Argentina”, says Sergio Berensztein, a political scientist. His aim in entertaining Ms Fernández is to encourage a smooth democratic handover, avoiding the violence and chaos that have marked political transitions in Argentina in the past.
Some observers worry that the pope is overplaying his hand politically. His plan to go to Cuba—for four days—in September en route to the United States will anger Republicans and risks undermining the American half of that trip.
The biggest test of Francis’s political skill will be whether he can help to bring about a peaceful and democratic transition in Venezuela, where the unpopular government of Nicolás Maduro faces likely defeat in a parliamentary election this year—if it is free and fair. “Behind the scenes he is trying to do everything he can in Venezuela to defuse confrontation,” says Jimmy Burns, the author of a forthcoming biography of Francis. Expect that to include the application of priestly pressure to Mr Maduro’s allies, Presidents Correa and Morales, this week.
From the print edition: The Americas
http://www.cronista.com/economiapolitica/El-Papa-peronista-segun-The-Economist-20150710-0096.html
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ECONOMÍA Y POLÍTICA 10.07.15 | 14:09
por CRONISTA.COM
The Economist
En el marco de la visita del Papa Francisco a Ecuador, Bolivia y Paraguay, la revista The Economist se encargó de describir el tono político de la gira del líder de la iglesia Católica en América Latina, mientras que advirtió sobre la preocupación de algunos analistas de que el Papa estuviese abusando su costado político.
“Si uno pudiese aplicar el el término a un prelado de 78 años de edad, que convirtió la falta de ostentación en un arte, entonces el Papa Francisco es una estrella de rock. O al menos es la forma en la que fue recibido esta semana en América Latina”, empieza el artículo de la revista bajo el título“The Peronist pope” (El Papa peronista).
Según la nota, “los tres países que visita el Papa son pequeños y pobres, cuya población, en su mayoría, está compuesta por pueblos originarios. Estos países fueron elegidos cuidadosamente. Francisco, que solía ser sacerdote jesuita en Argentina, valora el trabajo pastoral con los marginados, respeta la humildad popular y promete una ‘iglesia pobre, para los pobres’”. “Y sus palabras entusiasman a los defensores de la Teoría de la Liberación, un conjunto de ideas de izquierda que influenciaron a América Latina en las décadas de 1970 y 1980”, agrega.
Asimismo, uno de sus anfitriones, el presidente de Ecuador, Rafael Correa, “que se autodenomina ‘un cristiano de izquierda’, declaró esta semana que el Papa respalda las políticas que aplica en su país”. Mientras tanto, “el Papa hizo hincapié en el valor del pluralismo y advirtió que está en contra de las dictaduras, el culto a la personalidad y el afán de los liderazgos individuales”, añade el artículo.
Pero no es la primera vez que Francisco se muestra como un Papa con alto perfil político. También lo hizo al intervenir en la recomposición de las relaciones entre EE.UU. y Cuba. Y eso es lo preocupa a ciertos analistas sobre que el Papa estuviese abusando de su costado político. “Su plan de hacer una escala en Cuba en septiembre antes de visitar los Estados Unidos enojaría a los republicanos y pondría en riesgo la mitad del viaje”, dice el artículo.
Para The Economist, en tanto, “la mayor prueba de habilidad política de Francisco será si podrá ayudar a lograr una transición pacífica y democrática en Venezuela , donde el gobierno impopular de Nicolás Maduro se enfrenta a una probable derrota en las elecciones parlamentarias de este año (si es que son transparentes)”, concluye.
http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21657401-franciss-balancing-act-latin-america-peronist-popeThe Peronist pope
Francis’s balancing act in Latin AmericaJul 11th 2015 | From the print editionIF ONE can apply the term to a 78-year-old prelate who has turned lack of ostentation into an art form, then Pope Francis is a rock star. Or at least that is how he is being greeted in Latin America this week. Hundred of thousands have turned up for open-air masses in Ecuador, with more to follow in Bolivia and Paraguay. Yet the eight-day tour—the longest foreign trip so far in this papacy and the first to Spanish-speaking America—may do more than underline the popularity in his home region of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the first Latin American pope. It may add political definition to his papacy.
Still home to 40% of the world’s Catholics, Latin America has seen a swift advance of evangelical Protestantism in the past 40 years. Yet according to the Pew Research Centre, a think-tank in the United States, Paraguay (where 89% are Catholics), Ecuador (79%) and Bolivia (77%) remain bastions of the faith, along with Colombia and Mexico.
The pope’s most obvious purpose is to keep them that way by making the church more welcoming and more relevant. In Guayaquil, in Ecuador, in a mass celebrating the family (“the best social capital”) he spoke of his concern for those excluded from it—a reference to the quiet battle he is waging for more tolerance towards gay couples and divorcees. The issue will be taken up by a synod in October.
The three countries he is visiting are all fairly small and poor, with large Amerindian populations. They were chosen carefully. Francis, who used to be a Jesuit priest in Argentina, values pastoral work with those on the margins of society, respects popular piety and promises a “poor church, for the poor”.
His words have enthused supporters of liberation theology, a set of leftist ideas that were influential in Latin America in the 1970s and 1980s. Francis speeded up the beatification, which took place in May, of Óscar Romero, a Salvadorean archbishop who was gunned down by a right-wing death squad while celebrating mass in 1980 and is a hero to the left.
Yet Father Bergoglio always rejected Marxism and violent revolution, which some leftist priests supported. Rather than embracing liberation theology, he is reinterpreting it for a post-Marxist age. Romero’s “option for the poor wasn’t ideological but evangelical,” says the Vatican. The pope’s criticisms of free-market capitalism chime both with traditional Catholic social doctrine and with Peronism, Argentina’s populist-nationalist political movement, to which he was once close.
Two of the pope’s hosts, Ecuador’s president, Rafael Correa, and Bolivia’s Evo Morales, are hard-left allies of Venezuela’s authoritarian regime. They proclaim that they will take from the rich and give to the poor, while quietly squelching the opposition. Mr Correa, who calls himself a “Christian leftist”, publicly implied this week that the pope backs his policies. In a barely veiled rebuke to his host, the pope stressed the value of pluralism and warned against “dictatorships, personality cults and the eagerness for sole leaderships”.
Francis has already shown himself to be a highly political pope. His support for the secret talks that led to a diplomatic thaw between the United States and Cuba was crucial. When embassies reopen later this month after 54 years, he can claim some of the credit. He has five times received Argentina’s president, Cristina Fernández, a Peronist with whom he clashed when archbishop of Buenos Aires.
With a presidential election in October (in which Ms Fernández herself cannot stand), those meetings have provoked grumbling from opponents. But the pope is “very subtle in exercising influence in Argentina”, says Sergio Berensztein, a political scientist. His aim in entertaining Ms Fernández is to encourage a smooth democratic handover, avoiding the violence and chaos that have marked political transitions in Argentina in the past.
Some observers worry that the pope is overplaying his hand politically. His plan to go to Cuba—for four days—in September en route to the United States will anger Republicans and risks undermining the American half of that trip.
The biggest test of Francis’s political skill will be whether he can help to bring about a peaceful and democratic transition in Venezuela, where the unpopular government of Nicolás Maduro faces likely defeat in a parliamentary election this year—if it is free and fair. “Behind the scenes he is trying to do everything he can in Venezuela to defuse confrontation,” says Jimmy Burns, the author of a forthcoming biography of Francis. Expect that to include the application of priestly pressure to Mr Maduro’s allies, Presidents Correa and Morales, this week.
From the print edition: The Americas
http://www.cronista.com/economiapolitica/El-Papa-peronista-segun-The-Economist-20150710-0096.html
**
ECONOMÍA Y POLÍTICA 10.07.15 | 14:09
“El Papa peronista”, según The Economist
“Si uno pudiese aplicar el el término a un prelado de 78 años de edad, que convirtió la falta de ostentación en un arte, entonces el Papa Francisco es una estrella de rock”, dice la revista.por CRONISTA.COM
The Economist
En el marco de la visita del Papa Francisco a Ecuador, Bolivia y Paraguay, la revista The Economist se encargó de describir el tono político de la gira del líder de la iglesia Católica en América Latina, mientras que advirtió sobre la preocupación de algunos analistas de que el Papa estuviese abusando su costado político.
“Si uno pudiese aplicar el el término a un prelado de 78 años de edad, que convirtió la falta de ostentación en un arte, entonces el Papa Francisco es una estrella de rock. O al menos es la forma en la que fue recibido esta semana en América Latina”, empieza el artículo de la revista bajo el título“The Peronist pope” (El Papa peronista).
Según la nota, “los tres países que visita el Papa son pequeños y pobres, cuya población, en su mayoría, está compuesta por pueblos originarios. Estos países fueron elegidos cuidadosamente. Francisco, que solía ser sacerdote jesuita en Argentina, valora el trabajo pastoral con los marginados, respeta la humildad popular y promete una ‘iglesia pobre, para los pobres’”. “Y sus palabras entusiasman a los defensores de la Teoría de la Liberación, un conjunto de ideas de izquierda que influenciaron a América Latina en las décadas de 1970 y 1980”, agrega.
Asimismo, uno de sus anfitriones, el presidente de Ecuador, Rafael Correa, “que se autodenomina ‘un cristiano de izquierda’, declaró esta semana que el Papa respalda las políticas que aplica en su país”. Mientras tanto, “el Papa hizo hincapié en el valor del pluralismo y advirtió que está en contra de las dictaduras, el culto a la personalidad y el afán de los liderazgos individuales”, añade el artículo.
Pero no es la primera vez que Francisco se muestra como un Papa con alto perfil político. También lo hizo al intervenir en la recomposición de las relaciones entre EE.UU. y Cuba. Y eso es lo preocupa a ciertos analistas sobre que el Papa estuviese abusando de su costado político. “Su plan de hacer una escala en Cuba en septiembre antes de visitar los Estados Unidos enojaría a los republicanos y pondría en riesgo la mitad del viaje”, dice el artículo.
Para The Economist, en tanto, “la mayor prueba de habilidad política de Francisco será si podrá ayudar a lograr una transición pacífica y democrática en Venezuela , donde el gobierno impopular de Nicolás Maduro se enfrenta a una probable derrota en las elecciones parlamentarias de este año (si es que son transparentes)”, concluye.
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