Nicaraguan bishop to go to Rome amid security concerns

April 12, 2019 CNA Daily News News Briefs 0 Print

Managua, Nicaragua, Apr 12, 2019 / 12:01 pm (CNA).- Pope Francis has asked Auxiliary Bishop Silvio José Báez Ortega of Managua to serve the Church in Rome for a temporary period. Báez has faced security concerns as a vocal critic of the administration of Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega.

Báez said in a press conference April 10 that he did not ask to leave Nicaragua, but that he will be obedient to the pope’s request.

“I have not asked to leave Nicaragua. The Holy Father called me,” he said. “I want to make it clear that my heart has always been here in my land, in my homeland and in the midst of my people. My pastor’s heart will remain here in Nicaragua,” he told media.

The bishop said that he will carry Nicaragua in his heart, but that “this decision of the Holy Father, that I accepted and assumed, has made my heart cry.”

Cardinal Leopoldo José Brenes Solorzano of Managua said the pope’s request was made during a private audience with Báez at the Vatican several weeks ago.

Brenes explained that Báez will remain an auxiliary bishop of Managua during the undetermined period he is away from the diocese, and that he will go to Rome during the Easter season, after the busy schedule of Holy Week has concluded.

Báez, who has been the subject of threats because of his outspoken opposition to the Ortega administration during the crisis facing the country, said threats have not “paralyzed my ministry” or stopped him from sharing the Gospel and giving “constructive criticism.”

The Managua auxiliary was among a group of bishops who were assaulted by a pro-government group in 2018 when they went to free a group of protesters who had taken refuge in a basilica the previous day.

As they tried to enter San Sebastian basilica in Diriamba, about 25 miles south of Managua, their route was blocked, and the pro-government groups called them murderers and liars. Báez suffered a cut on his arm, and he was hit in the stomach and robbed of his episcopal insignia.

Anti-government protests in Nicaragua began in April 2018. They resulted in more than 300 deaths, and the country’s bishops mediated on-again, off-again peace talks until they broke down in June.

A new round of dialogue began Feb. 27 at the INCAE Business School in Managua.

Báez, 60, has been auxiliary bishop of Managua for 10 years, and has worked Cardinal Brenes closely throughout this time.

Brenes said that in his meeting with Pope Francis last month, the auxiliary bishop shared about his ministry as a bishop and “part of our social work that he and the bishops’ conference have developed with the suffering people of our country.”

Pope Francis listened closely and then expressed his concerns to Báez, the cardinal related. “The Holy Father has asked him to go to Rome for a while, he has not told him [for what length of time time], but it would not be a permanent matter.”

Nicaragua’s crisis began last year after Ortega announced social security and pension reforms. The changes were soon abandoned in the face of widespread, vocal opposition, but protests only intensified after more than 40 protestors were killed by security forces.

The pension reforms which triggered the unrest were modest, but protests quickly turned to Ortega’s authoritarian bent.

Ortega has been president of Nicaragua since 2007, and oversaw the abolition of presidential term limits in 2014.

The Church had suggested that elections, which are not scheduled until 2021, be held this year, but Ortega has ruled this out.

Ortega was a leader in the Sandinista National Liberation Front, which had ousted the Somoza dictatorship in 1979 and fought US-backed right-wing counterrevolutionaries during the 1980s. Ortega was also leader of Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990.

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Chilean bishops’ president names delegate to replace him at papal meeting

January 2, 2019 CNA Daily News 1

Santiago, Chile, Jan 2, 2019 / 04:03 pm (ACI Prensa).- At the Vatican summit to discuss sex abuse next month, the secretary general of the Chilean Bishops Conference will take the place of the conference president, who is embroiled in the nation’s current sex abuse crisis.

Bishop Fernando Ramos, apostolic administrator of Rancagua and secretary general of the conference, will represent the Chilean bishops at the meeting requested by Pope Francis, which will include the heads of bishops’ conferences from around the world.

The anti-abuse summit will be held at the Vatican Feb. 21-24. While the presidents of the national bishops’ conferences have been invited, Bishop Santiago Silva will not attend.

Silva, who serves as president of the Chilean Bishops’ Conference, has been subpoenaed on charges of covering up abuse within the Military Diocese, which he has headed since July 2015.

“Given that this is an important meeting called by the Holy Father,” Ramos told the La Tercera newspaper, Silva asked him to attend “in order to avoid shifting the focus to… the person of the president himself.”

Ramos told La Tercera that at the most recent Plenary Assembly of the bishops’ conference in November 2018, Silva said that he was willing to continue as the conference president or to step down.

“At that time, he was asked to continue in his position as president,” Ramos said. “Regarding the invitation that the Holy Father has made to the presidents of the bishops’ conferences of the world, for the February meeting, the president of the Chilean Bishops’ Conference asked me to attend.”

The Church in Chile is still reeling from revelations of a sex abuse scandal following an in-depth investigation by Maltese Archbishop Charles Scicluna and Msgr. Jordi Bertomeu of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which resulted in a 2,300-page report on the scandal.

Pope Francis initially dismissed some of the abuse cover up allegations as “calumny,” but later apologized and said he had been misinformed in judging the case, due to “a lack of truthful and balanced information.”

The pope then summoned all the Chilean bishops to Rome in May 2018 for a meeting in which he harshly criticized them for a systematic cover-up of abuse involving not only the destruction of documents, but superficial investigations that led to moving accused abusers to other schools or parishes where they had access to children.

Following that meeting, every bishop in the country submitted their resignation. The pope has accepted several of the resignations and is expected to accept several more in the coming months.

In his interview with La Tercera, published Dec. 29, Bishop Ramos acknowledged that the abuse crisis has contributed to an ongoing decrease in the size of the Chilean Church.

He pointed to a survey finding that Catholics made up 73 percent of the population 20 years ago, but now make up 55 percent. This trend is partly due to “a process of profound transformation of Chilean society where cultural forms of expression of greater individualism and materialism are emerging,” he said.

The bishop added that “the cases of abuse and mishandling that we have had as a Church have accelerated this process of disaffiliation. We must acknowledge our responsibility that we have not responded well to this kind of situation and that has affected Church affiliation.”

Regarding the response to the sex abuse crisis in the country, Ramos argued that the Church in Chile is not “the same Church that it was a year ago.”

“[S]everal bishops have been changed, [and] a very profound process of reflection by our communities has begun, with the aim of our having in 2020 an Ecclesiastical Assembly where a series of pastoral guidelines for the life of the Church can take their final form,” he said.

 

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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