Bolivia: the Church and the march of the indigenous
Bolivian Cardinal Julio Terrazas Sandoval, Archbishop of Santa Cruz de la Sierra,
has appealed for people to take into account the concerns of the TIPNIS indigenous
communities who are currently marching on the capital La Paz to protest against government
plans to erase more than 2,300 square miles of rain forest over two decades to build
a highway.
During his homily last Sunday, the 75year-old Cardinal said the
issue at stake is not just the problem of a few but of all members of society, and
he called for greater understanding and charity, particularly in helping the poorest
and most marginalized to bear the cross of suffering and poverty.
Indigenous
and environmentalists groups are on a 40-day, 846-kilometer march from Trinidad to
La Paz to protest the construction of a 300-kilometer highway aimed to connect Brazil
to Pacific ports in Chile and Peru, and that will plow through a nature preserve,
home to 15,000 natives and to endangered fresh water dolphins and blue macaws.
Alejandro
Bermudez, editor of the largest Catholic news agency in Spanish, ACI Prensa, told
Vatican Radio that “the Church in Bolivia has always supported progress and development
when it is of direct benefit to the people, particularly the poorest sector of society.
But it must be in harmony with respect for Creation and the legitimate rights of those
peoples who lives are tied to the land”. Listen to Emer McCarthy’s full interview
with Alejandro Bermudez:
(PHOTO
Members of the Moxos ethnic group march during a protest in Trinidad, Bolivia)