Religious right begins to flex its muscles in secular Mexico

By David Agren, Special To The Washington Post

MEXICO CITY — Conservatives from all corners of the country converged on Mexico City on a recent Saturday for “The National March for the Family,” which took aim at the president’s plans to enshrine same-sex marriage in the constitution.

The LGBT community and its allies launched a counterprotest, waving rainbow flags and carrying pictures of former presidents Benito Juárez and Plutarco Elías Calles — lionized as heroes of the secular state, figures who curbed Catholic Church privileges in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

These contradictory images symbolize a growing conflict in this nation, where the church has been relegated to the sidelines of public life for decades. Now the religious right is rising as a political force, with both conservative Catholics and members of the growing evangelical community attempting to influence Congress and mobilize the masses.

“This is a clash between the secular state and the sectors that don’t accept the secular state,” says Ilán Semo, historian at the Jesuit-run Iberoamerican University in Mexico City.

The modern Mexican state was created by revolutionaries at odds with the Catholic Church, and they sought to curb its authority through measures such as introducing a secular school system. For decades, Mexico was considered the most anticlerical country in Latin America outside of Cuba, despite the fact that the country is overwhelmingly Catholic. Census data shows that 83 percent profess the faith.

But politicians have punted the old protocols over the past 25 years as they have sought the blessing of bishops, appeared publicly with prelates and kissed the pope’s ring — unthinkable a generation ago.

The use of religious symbolism is increasing: Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a leftist who is among the front-runners for the 2018 presidential election, christened his new party with the acronym MORENA — also a name for the popular national patroness Our Lady of Guadalupe.

The country’s expanding evangelical and non-Catholic congregations are becoming politically active, too, having started their own grouping, known as the Social Encounter Party.

The Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, ruled for seven decades over a one-party system before the opposition won the presidency in 2000. Now, in a competitive democratic system, the PRI increasingly finds itself facing a ceiling of support in the mid-30 percent range and needing new sources of votes. That is one reason it has openly courted the Catholic Church and evangelicals, says Carlos Bravo Regidor, professor at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics.

It is a dramatic change in a country where, for much of the 20th century, the church had no legal status and was barred from owning property. Relations between church and state were restored only in 1992, when Mexico and the Vatican established diplomatic ties and a raft of religious restrictions were lifted.

The Mexican Catholic Church — which has put a priority on religious freedom, the teaching of religion in public schools and removing restrictions on its ability to own radio and television stations — had previously attempted to make incursions into politics, pushing back in the 1970s against health officials promoting family planning.

PRI governments of the era prevailed. But observers such as Semo express some doubts about President Enrique Peña Nieto’s ability to resist church pressure as his approval rating hovers at less than 25 percent — the product of scandals over corruption, the security forces and the decision to invite U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump to Mexico.

“The difference [now] is that no president has been this unpopular,” Semo says.

Even the president’s own party is resisting his wishes. The PRI in Congress has shelved Peña Nieto’s same-sex-marriage initiative — which also included putting positive portrayals of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Mexicans in educational materials — saying the timing was not convenient.

Organizers of the “pro-family” marches claim credit for a “punishment vote” against the president’s same-sex-marriage initiative in gubernatorial elections earlier this year. The PRI lost in seven of 12 states, although polls indicated the races were decided on the issues of insecurity and corruption. Activists plan to push a citizen initiative in Congress to outlaw same-sex marriage, even though the Supreme Court has declared laws against such unions discriminatory. Same-sex marriages currently are allowed in Mexico City and several states.

“This is something that if the PRI doesn’t correct will guarantee its defeat in 2018” in the presidential race, said Rodrigo Iván Cortés, spokesman for the National Front for the Family, which claims to have attracted 1.3 million Mexicans to marches nationwide — a figure critics consider exaggerated.

While the PRI traditionally had a cool relationship with the church, Peña Nieto and the Catholic hierarchy enjoyed cordial relations — until recently.

The Archdiocese of Mexico City was quick to annul the first marriage of Peña Nieto’s then-girlfriend, soap-opera star Angélica Rivera, in 2009, ruling the ceremony invalid because it took place on a beach in Acapulco. Bishops from Peña Nieto’s home state later took him to the Vatican, where he publicly announced his wedding plans for the first time in an audience with Pope Benedict XVI.

In the run-up to the 2012 elections, the PRI voted in favor of a constitutional amendment removing some restrictions on religious freedom.

But these days, the bishops and the president appear at odds.

“After talking to many bishops, I would say the feeling is one of betrayal,” said the Rev. Hugo Valdemar, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Mexico City. “Peña Nieto was always very close to people in the church, he said publicly that the pope’s agenda was the president’s agenda, then he comes out with [the same-sex marriage initiative]. It surprised us enormously.” The bishops’ conference declined to comment.

Church-state relations appear to have become especially close in recent years on the local level. Governors have given bishops vehicles, allowed them to ride in their helicopters, donated properties for building churches “and turned a blind eye in cases of accusations against priests,” said a politician with the traditionally Catholic-friendly National Action Party (PAN), who was previously involved in maintaining its relationships with bishops. He spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject. The PRI in Congress did not respond to interview requests.

Bishops in turn have tended to stay silent on issues such as insecurity and corruption, even with the decade-long drug war claiming more than 100,000 lives. They have, however, actively pursued social policies such as prohibitions on abortion — achieved in at least 18 states since 2008.

Pope Francis rebuked Mexico’s bishops on a February visit as indolent and complacent, calling them “princes”and warning against backroom deals.

“Don’t be clerics of the state,” he later wrote in a seminary guest book.

The pope, however, blessed the recent “pro-family” marches.

“It is a sign of the pope’s willingness to keep a good relation with the Mexican bishops,” said Rodolfo Soriano-Núñez, a sociologist studying the Catholic Church.

It is not clear how much influence the religious right will be able to yield. The marches marshaled more middle-class Mexicans than the downtrodden masses.

In addition, there are historic suspicions regarding church meddling in politics. Polling in 2015 by the National Autonomous University of Mexico showed 42 percent of Mexicans opposed religious authorities influencing the vote.

“There many Mexicans who are Catholic,” said Semo, the historian, “but they don’t want priests involved in politics.”