Aparecida, Brazil – Pope Benedict XVI blamed Marxism and unbridled capitalism for Latin America’s problems Sunday, urging bishops to mold a generation of Catholic leaders in politics to reverse the church’s declining influence in the region.
Before boarding a plane at the end of a five-day trip to the most populous Catholic nation, Benedict warned that legalized contraception and abortion in Latin America threaten “the future of the peoples” and said the historic Catholic identity of the region is under assault.
Like his predecessor Pope John Paul II, Benedict criticized capitalism’s negative effects as well as the Marxist influences that have motivated some grass- roots Catholic activists.
“The Marxist system, where it found its way into government, not only left a sad heritage of economic and ecological destruction but also a painful destruction of the human spirit,” he said in his opening address at a conference of bishops aimed at re- energizing the church’s influence.
He also warned of unfettered capitalism and globalization, blamed by many in Latin America for a deep divide between the rich and poor. The pope said it could give “rise to a worrying degradation of personal dignity through drugs, alcohol and deceptive illusions of happiness.”
Benedict said Indians had been “silently longing” to become Christians when Spanish and Portuguese conquerors took over their native lands centuries ago, though many Indians were enslaved and killed.
“In effect, the proclamation of Jesus and of his Gospel did not at any point involve an alienation of the pre-Columbus cultures, nor was it the imposition of a foreign culture,” he said.
