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Hope for an End to Mexico’s Narco-Violence: Response to Jennifer Scheper Hughes

By Stephen Andes

…ence. For instance, Father Hugo Valdemar, spokesman for the archdiocese of Mexico, accused Mexico City’s recent abortion law of killing more innocents than the drug cartels, implicating Mayor Marcelo Ebrard’s administration along the way. Ebrard promptly sued the cleric and the row continues. The culture wars, just as with Church-state conflict in the 1920s, are having a profound ability to distract Catholics from confronting the social and econom…

Church and State in Mexico: A Political Party Wavers on Women’s Rights

By Ruth Samuelson

…I politician Armando Tonatiuh González kicked off the battle that produced Mexico City’s historic 2007 abortion law. Standing in Mexico City’s central square, Tonatiuh González promoted the policy by handing out condoms and informational brochures. Of course, even before the country’s anti-abortion onslaught, the PRI sided with religious forces on occasion. In the 1990s, PRI President Carlos Salinas de Gortari supported constitutional reforms over…

A Pope, a Poet, and a Drug War

By Stephen Andes

…tions. A bus caravan of peace activists led by Sicilia traveled throughout Mexico in the summer of 2011, seeking to raise awareness and give a face to Mexico’s suffering. At rallies in cities such as Morelia, Durango, Torreón, Monterrey, and Ciudad Juárez, loved ones held pictures of the dead, putting a human face on Mexico’s grief. Sicilia’s loss has resonated with many other parents whose children have become victims. Over the months since Sicil…

Colonialism and the Crisis Inside the Crisis of Catholic Sexual Abuse

By Kathleen Holscher

…suggests a far higher per-capita rate of offending clergy than even in New Mexico. In New Mexico, the victims of abuse were mainly Nuevomexicano and Indigenous kids. The abusers were often, but not always, white. Many came to New Mexico from faraway places, but some were local men. Colonialism is a structure that has touched everybody and everything here. It has formed New Mexican Catholicism since the arrival of Spaniards in the 16th century, and…

Mexican Marriage Marches Show Struggle Between Church and Secular State; Pro-LGBT Mormon Group Grows After ‘Apostate’ Declaration; Botswana Gives Anti-Gay US Pastor the Boot; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…this month that Mexico’s evangelical party, Encuentro Social, had bought a flight to Mexico City for a Colombian lawmaker active in recent protests against Colombia’s education minister, who is a lesbian. (Hernandez did respond to messages from BuzzFeed News.) The report also said activists were coming from Peru and Panama. A tiny group of people responded to NOM’s call for a solidarity protest at the Mexican embassy in Washington, D.C. Hazteoir.o…

Mexico’s War on Saint Death

By Joseph Laycock

…demonstrations, a new factor came into play: swine flu. Fear of the disease has caused church attendance to drop by as much as 60 percent in Mexico City. At the same time, devotion to Santa Muerte is said to be higher than ever. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has pledged to help Mexico against the cartels, and various NGOs have offered aid against the swine flu. While Mexico’s troubles cannot go on forever, it is not clear what the future hold…

Death Couture: Not For Halloween Only

By Stephen Andes

…al media has bought what they are selling. The Roman Catholic hierarchy in Mexico faces the uncomfortable choice of how to respond to La Santa Muerte, an image that has now been monopolized by criminals. Still, thousands of Mexican Catholics not associated in any way with the drug trade remain devotees. As recent polls conducted by both Latinobarómetro and Consulta Mitofsky have shown, popular confidence in the Church still remains stronger than o…

US Names Int’l Envoy for LGBT Rights; Marriage revolution spreads in Mexico; Scott Lively Warns World of Anti-Christ; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…they’ve already won make marriage equality all but inevitable. “Outside of Mexico, and even inside of Mexico, these advances are not widely known,” Méndez said. “It is very slow, it is very invisible — but it is irreversible. Dominican Republic: Religious, political leaders criticize push for LGBT tourism The openly gay US Ambassador to the Dominican Repuiblican, James “Wally” Brewster, criticized comments by Tourism Minister Franciso García’ that…

Like Azusa Street Baptized into Bureaucracy: Mexico’s Flourishing LLDM Church Loses its Apostle

By Michael Schulson

…on. The 2010 Mexican census reported only around 200,000 members, but that number may well be low (the Mormon church in Mexico has argued that the religious count was inaccurate). Independent scholarly estimates for LLDM’s worldwide population range as high as seven million. Still: LLDM is big. And it’s not easy to classify the church that has emerged. In terms of theology and ritual, its flavor is firmly pentecostal and charismatic: Church member…

Mormons Fight Marriage Equality in Mexico; Is Catholic Church Italy’s Anti-Gay NRA?; Nigerian Anglicans Cut Ties With UK Diocese; Global LGBT Recap

By Peter Montgomery

…e guaranteed equal rights under the law,” he wrote. He also announced that Mexico would become part of the UN’s LGBTI Core Group promoting equality internationally. “I understand that these measures will be met with some resistance and that a number of taboos related to the topic still persist,” he wrote, “However, as President, it is my duty to ensure that the personal beliefs and customs of some do not limit the human rights of others.” Part of…