Church must allow change

In understanding the direction of the Roman Catholic Church
after Pope John Paul II, Mexico serves as an elucidating example of
both the changing face of the church and the particular challenges
it will encounter in the 21st century.

Mexican Catholicism’s history with liberal populism
throughout the 20th century, and with modernity in the last quarter
century, mirrors the larger church’s delicate relationship
with the historical forces shaping the world.

The Catholic church has become the church of the third world in
demographics. Its traditional strongholds in Europe have become
“infected” with secular materialism.

Across Europe, congregations are diminishing. Falling birth
rates have contributed to an “older” European church.
In “Catholic” Italy, France and Spain, Catholicism has
taken on a ceremonial role, like Buddhism in Japan.

Major life events such as baptism and marriage take place inside
a church, but for the most part, younger generations live their
lives independent of the church and its teaching.

Latin America, however, has the largest number of Catholics in
the world, most of them young. Masses are regularly filled, even on
weekdays. The church’s strong support for the poor majority
against oppressive governments, death squads, drug traffickers and
international corporations leaves the church with wide influence in
spite of (or because of) repeated assassinations of priests,
bishops and even cardinals who speak out in the face of endemic
corruption.

The persecution of the Catholic church by a “liberal,
populist” Mexican government from the mid-19th to 20th
centuries sowed the seeds for a staunchly Catholic, conservative
population.

Remember that the pope’s affinity for the poor was
balanced by his experience of Communist oppression in his native
Poland ““ thus his rejection of Marxist-inspired Liberation
Theology.

But the rise of modernity coupled with the demise of the Soviet
Union brought a new enemy to spiritualism greater than even godless
Communism. The Catholic church was no longer being persecuted, but
worse, ignored. The youth across the first world and in the former
Soviet bloc were not interested in spiritual renewal but in living
materially prosperous lives like the Americans on TV.

Similarly, as the memory of state persecution of the church
recedes in the minds of younger Mexicans, Catholic congregations
stagnate while “American” materialism and Protestantism
make major inroads.

The College of Cardinals in Rome is aware that while in the
previous century the challenge was Communist repression, this
century’s challenge is the church’s influence in the
face of modernity.

For the first time, there is talk of a Latin American or African
(where it is growing fastest) pontiff to reflect the changing face
of the church.

Ideologically, if orthodox traditionalists win, look for a
traditional, authoritarian pope like John Paul II. For them, the
important battleground is the traditional family as threatened by
abortion, birth control and same-sex marriage. Unlike what people
read in Dan Brown’s books, such as “The Da Vinci
Code,” women are critical to the church. The Mexican
government in the 1920s targeted the religious practices of women
because it understood best that Catholic mothers raise the next
generation of devout Catholics.

If reformers win, the next pope may disperse control in certain
practices (celibate priesthood, etc.) to local bishops instead of
centralizing it in Rome.

Most likely, the policies of the next pope will be a continuum
of the last, as John Paul II appointed all but three of 117 voting
cardinals.

Still, there will be some refinement reflecting the particular
challenges of the 21st century.

Globalization, trade, environmental policy, sustainable
development and population growth already intersect with morality.
The next pontiff must use the languages of humanism and science to
further the argument that poverty isn’t caused by
overpopulation, but by the unjust and wasteful distribution of
resources.

To advance its moral agenda in topics such as abortion and
euthanasia, look for the use of developments in fields like
cognitive science or linguistics, which will further the argument
for the unique dignity of human beings.

The church will need to use the tools of modernism to keep Latin
America Catholic, maintain growth in Africa and continue to make
inroads in Asia, especially China.

Of course, the Catholic church has already survived two
millennia of external and internal conflicts. Perhaps the church
will weather on through this age like it has before.

Quijano is a third-year linguistics and philosophy
student.