Latin American Pope? (cont.)

Love and justice
The level of comfort the Pope felt in Latin America is clearly portrayed in the way he described a trip to Central America and Venezuela: "I enjoyed the unmistakable atmosphere of human warmth typical of Latin America, an atmosphere which I found at every stage of my journey: festive crowds, including a large number of young people, made every journey a family meeting, indeed, a family feast." The "feast," nevertheless, did not blind the Pope to what he described as "the millions of the poor in Latin America, crucified because of human injustice." During his numerous visits to Latin America, he confronted various dictatorships, from Rafael Videla's Argentina (1982) and Augusto Pinochet's Chile (1987) to the Sandinistas' Nicaragua (1983) and Fidel Castro's Cuba (1998).
True to his vision of freedom, he was the first world leader to foresee the consequences of the Berlin Wall's fall for Latin America. "The change of climate occurred to a considerable extent against the background of the events of 1989," the Pope said during a 1996 general audience at the Vatican. "Central America ceased to be a 'shooting range' of influence and conflict between the two 'superpowers' and is living its own history with greater autonomy. In this new situation, the individual countries are called to face urgent problems such as the relationship between capital and labor and the equitable management of goods." That is why, in all his dealings with Latin America, Pope John Paul II clearly insisted upon the same idea: the scandal of injustice in such a deeply Catholic region and the need to close this disconnect. "Those who say that the Holy Father is progressive in the social and conservative in the doctrine have no idea of the profound coherence of the Pope's thought," said Carlos Corsi Otarola, a Colombian Catholic politician, after one of the Pontiff's visits. "For him, social justice sparks from a converted heart that turns Christian life into daily life."

Duty of bishops
The Pope insisted to Latin American bishops that their role within the Church is the one of preserving and strengthening the faith. During a 2001 audience with the Pontifical Council of Latin America, the pontiff described the bishops' duty as "the effort to preserve, defend and increase the integrity of the faith." "Your nations need, today as in the past, great evangelizers with the spirit and talent of St. Turibius of Mogrovejo," he said, adding: "He, whom I proclaimed patron of all the bishops of Latin America in 1983, is a genuine example of a pastor whom we can and must imitate in the task of the new evangelization." Nevertheless, for some critics, Pope John Paul moved the Church in Latin America backward. "The basic core of this restoration was very clear: It was a return to the Council of Trent that would limit the active participation of the laity and restore full authority to the clergy. The basic goal was the return of clericalism," wrote Belgian-born liberation theologian Joseph Comblin in the July 2, 2003, issue of the National Catholic Reporter.

"This is nonsense," responded Alberto Methol Ferre, a Uruguayan Catholic intellectual and diplomat. "No one has done more to bring the Second Vatican Council to life in Latin America. "Liturgy is finding the right balance, lay movements are thriving, vocations are up in almost all countries… you can call that 'the Council of Trent' only if blinded by ideology," he added. "Moreover, this Pope will be remembered not only as John Paul the Great, but in a sense, provably as the first 'Latin American' pope."

[Alejandro Bermudez directs the ACI Prensa news service in Peru.]