The Pope's Message in Bolivia and to the World
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- Published on Wednesday, 05 August 2015 22:45
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A Socialist Project e-bulletin .... No. 1151 .... August 6, 2015
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The Pope's Message in Bolivia and to the World:
Report by a Canadian participant
Richard Fidler
In retrospect, it must be said that the College of Cardinals made an astute decision in 2013 when they chose Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina as the Vicar of Christ. Pope Francis, as he is now called, has emerged as a world leader in speaking out on the major social and humanitarian issues ranging from climate crisis to poverty and social exclusion. Francis, the first Pope from the Western Hemisphere, is especially popular in Latin America, where the Church of Rome is contending with burgeoning evangelical sects and emerging secular movements around such issues as abortion and gay rights.
Early on in his papacy, Francis indicated his close... affinity with President Evo Morales and the "Process of Change" that Morales and the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) are spearheading in Bolivia. When the initial World Meeting of Popular Movements was held at the Vatican in October 2014, Morales was the only elected head of state who attended.
In December, following the failure of the United Nations COP20 climate talks in Lima to take meaningful actions to prevent catastrophic climate warming, Morales urged the environment ministers of the ALBA countries to organize a "world encounter of social movements" in 2015 that would develop "a proposal to save life and humanity."
