In the Church, it is said that the relationship between Pope Francis and Alberto Fernández “is on hold”

In the first months of his administration, Alberto Fernández bragged about his relationship with Pope Francis. He slipped that he had had contact with the pontiff, without specifying whether they were by phone or by mail. Too: these “contacts” are interrupted for a few months. It is no secret that the president’s efforts to promote legalization of abortion complicated the relationship, in particular for having put it in the middle of the pandemic and the impact of a long quarantine which deteriorated the already very degraded social situation.

With all, the drop that broke the glass -At the end of the day, Jorge Bergoglio knew that sooner or later the abortion issue would burst into Congress (as in 2018) because Alberto Fernández himself had announced it from the campaign- it was a transcendent which was launched by the government after the approval of the project to the deputies, in November, and its treatment in the Senate, at the end of the year. It was a supposed message that the pontiff had sent to the president.

The version, which ran the Casa Rosada in those frantic days of December, when the executive branch tried to get the votes and pressured – according to the Church’s belief – on the senators, attributed to Francisco having declared “If the project needs to be approved, approve it once and for all and turn the page”. Translated: that the Pope has considered the dispute and that lawmakers must not regret Francis’ opposition during the vote.

“The president crossed a line”they said to Bugle near the pontiff. This sentence could be interpreted as follows, according to the source: that Alberto Fernández has the right to send a project to Congress, regardless of whether the Pope does not like it – and very much -. And despite showing ingratitude for doing it after asking Francisco for help – and getting it – in the case of the debt renegotiation with the Monetary Fund.

But quite another – following the reasoning accepted by the source – is that the president manipulate to the pontiff for the benefit of his design. You don’t have to be a great connoisseur of Jorge Bergoglio’s personality to know that if he hates something, he is being manipulated politically. Cristina Kirchner had already made the most of the support Francisco had given her for fear that her second term would end and a crisis would erupt.

Not only were “contacts” interrupted, beyond the formalities of diplomatic relations. Francisco also agreed that the Argentine bishops criticize the government when they consider that there are reasons. Perhaps it became clear during the trip – surrounded by the utmost discretion – that the president of the episcopate, the bishop Oscar Ojea, took place in January at the Vatican and its various meetings with the Pope.

The truth is that on his return, Bishop Ojea was unusually harsh in the face of the scandal of VIP vaccinations. “We are perplexed by the politicization of the vaccine,” he said in his weekly reflection posted on social networks. In addition, he warned that in this matter “we must have a great delicacy because it is about life or death” and recalled the concepts of Francis on the priorities of vaccination campaigns.

More recently, the episcopate has criticized the repression of protests in Formosa because of the draconian restrictions that the governor Gildo Insfran imposed before the pandemic. “The violent repression of citizens who claim their human and social rights cannot be accepted,” he said in a statement. And he asked “to move away from personal or institutional arrogance, typical of other tragic moments in our country”.

Another area of ​​concern in the Church is the subjugation of justice by the ruling party. In February, the bishops of the north-west warned that “democracy is threatened by the lack of respect for the division of the three powers, by the lack of independence of the judiciary”. In April, the hundred bishops of the country will hold their first assembly of the year and must decide to pronounce on the national situation.