U.S. Bishops Express Solidarity With Church, People of Mexico

U.S. Roman Catholic bishops have expressed their solidarity with the church and people of Mexico, including embattled Bishop Samuel Ruiz of San Cristobal de las Casas.

“We share your anguish over the loss of life brought about by the insurrection, especially the killings of innocent noncombatants,” Bishop Daniel Reilly of Norwich, Conn., said in a letter to Archbishop Adolfo Suarez Rivera, president of the Mexican Episcopal Conference.

Reilly is chairman of the U.S. Catholic Conference Committee on international policy.

The Jan. 14 letter, made public just recently, was written in response to the Mexican bishops’ statement two days earlier, “For Peace and Justice in Chiapas.” That statement was prompted by the peasant uprising in the Mexican state of Chiapas and efforts by the Mexican army--amid accusations of human rights abuses--to put down the rebellion.

Some government officials had also accused church leaders, singling out Ruiz, of aiding the uprising.

Reilly said the violent events in Chiapas “have deeply touched us,” and noted that the U.S. bishops were “impressed by the role that the church has played and continues to play in denouncing the violence, in calling for dialogue and a political settlement of the conflict, and in defending human rights, especially the rights of the poorest and most vulnerable.”

In their statement, the Mexican bishops blamed “the situation of misery, helplessness and scorn in which the peasants and indigenous people of Chiapas, as in other parts of Mexico” as the root of the violence along with “the misuse of wealth by some.”

The Mexican bishops also criticized “the recourse to armed insurrection as a way of solving the real problems of misery and injustice” and said that it would “be equally condemnable for the Mexican Army to overstep its bounds in the fulfillment of its duty,” reminding them to “respect the civilian population.”