Interesting obituary in the Times this morning:
Cardinal Ignacio Velasco
Influential South American cleric who prayed that God would deliver
Venezuela from the threat of communism
LAST YEAR Hugo Chávez, the former paratrooper, now President of
Venezuela, called the Church “a tumour on the nation”, exhorting
bishops to “do penance” for refusing to visit slum-dwellers and
describing priests as “devils under their cassocks”. The controversial
clashes between the State and the Church, under Cardinal Ignacio
Velasco, the former leader of Venezuela’s Roman Catholics, have
reflected the turbulent climate of the country’s politics.
Velasco ignored calls for him to exorcise the President from opponents
declaring Chávez to be the anti-Christ, and appeared on television to
denounce Chavez’s tax reforms and exhort an end to the violence
engulfing Venezuela as businessmen furious at Chávez’s attempts to
control the oil industry joined trade unionists in anti-Government
protests.
Recently Velasco prayed at a Mass in Caracas that God would free
Venezuela from the threat of communism, but Chávez is supported by
left-wing Catholic clergy who endorse the social reform policies that
swept him to power in 1998.
Like most of Venezuela’s conservative episcopacy, Velasco was highly
dubious of Chavez’s plan to refashion or “Bolivarise” every national
institution. Naturally, there were rumours that he wished to
Bolivarise the Church, which subsequently commanded Venezuelans’
respect as the one national institution that did not change. But many
Catholics felt that Velasco had seriously damaged Church claims to
political independence by supporting the coup that briefly promised to
replace Chávez in April 2002.
Television footage showed the Cardinal cheering for Pedro Carmona
Estanga, the substitute for Chávez during the military-civil coup.
Later it emerged that Velasco had signed a decree authorising
Carmona’s administration to suspend the constitution and overturn the
National Assembly. Even clergy opposed to Chávez cringed as the
cardinal later explained that, convinced Chávez had resigned, he had
signed the decree without reading its contents, assuming incorrectly
that they matched the paper calling for a government of national unity
recently produced by the Venezuelan Bishops’ Conference.
He tried to salvage the situation by urging Venezuelans to give Chávez
a second chance after the ex-president was dramatically returned to
power by army officers 48 hours after being deposed. Capitalising on
the natural piety of Venezuelans, Chávez revealed that he had
confessed his sins to the cardinal, who visited him during his brief
exile to Venezuela’s Caribbean island, Orchila. Together, Chávez
explained, they had held hands praying together beneath the stars.
Chávez urged Venezuelans to copy their example and forgive each other.
This newfound peace did not last — soon Chavez was threatening to sue
the cardinal for conspiring with the coup and last November,
pro-Government supporters lobbed a grenade into Velasco’s home.
Recently Velasco said that, despite suffering from terminal cancer, he
had received death threats.
Ignacio Antonio Velasco was born in Acarigua, west Venezuela. He
entered junior seminary at the age of 12 and completed his studies at
the Salesian University in Turin and the Gregorian University in Rome.
After ordination in 1955, he returned home to teach in Salesian
schools, becoming Provincial of the Venezuelan Salesians in 1972.
Later he was given responsibility by his order for South America’s
Pacific/Caribbean region and in 1989 was made titular bishop of
Utimira and Apostolic Vicar of Puerto Ayacucho, a region including
swaths of the Amazon jungle.
In 1995, Velasco became Archbishop of Caracas and, on becoming
cardinal in 2001, he announced that he wished to act as a “bridge” for
“an exchange of ideas”, adding prophetically that “unless there is
clearly something negative that needs to be said. And the Church will
always say it.”
Cardinal Ignacio Velasco, leader of Venezuela’s Roman Catholics, was
born on January 17, 1929. He died from cancer on July 7, 2003, aged
74.
--
"Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You."
- Attrib: Pauline Reage.
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