The Archdiocese of Caracas announced the abrupt suspension on Wednesday of a scheduled weekend Mass in celebration of the recent canonization of Saints José Gregorio Hernández and Carmen Rendiles, Venezuela’s first Catholic saints.
Although the Archdiocese cited overcrowding as the alleged reason for the sudden cancellation, ACI Prensa, the Spanish-language division of the Catholic News Agency, noted that the announcement occurs amid tensions between the Venezuelan Catholic Church and socialist dictator Nicolás Maduro.
Pope Leo XIV canonized seven new saints on Sunday at St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican, among which were Venezuelan Saints José Gregorio Hernández and María Carmen Rendiles. The Maduro regime sent an official delegation to attend the canonization, leading to tensions between the socialist delegation and the Venezuelan faithful who rejected their presence at the event.
In one such moment of tension, a reporter from online Catholic outlet The Pillar was assaulted by a regime delegation member identified as businessman Ricardo Cisneros for asking the Vatican Secretariat of State Archbishop Edgar Robinson Peña Parra about the Maduro regime’s politicization of the canonizations. The Vatican condemned the assault on the reporter.
The socialist regime, via propagandists on social media, has attempted to present the false narrative that the canonization of Saint Hernández was only possible thanks to the efforts of dictator Nicolás Maduro. In reality, the canonization process for Saint Hernández started 76 years ago in 1949, 50 years before the arrival of the socialist regime to power in 1999.
The Maduro regime reportedly claims that the dictator’s encounter with the late Pope Francis in 2013 was fundamental for the canonization even though the corresponding statement from the Vatican issued after Pope Francis met with Maduro makes no mention of the dictator’s alleged efforts for the canonization.
To celebrate the canonization of both saints, the Archdiocese of Caracas was preparing to hold a celebratory “Feast of Sainthood” Mass at a stadium in Caracas on Saturday, October 25.
On Wednesday, three days before the event, the Archdiocese held a press conference announcing the sudden cancellation of the Mass at the stadium because they had allegedly tallied 80,000 registered participants, an amount that far exceeds the venue’s some 48,000 seats.
According to the local outlet El Estimulo, the regime allegedly requested 12,000 seats in the stadium’s central area that the Church intended to use to seat special guests. El Estimulo said that “faced with questions about the alleged politicization of the canonization of the two Venezuelan Catholics, the Venezuelan church reportedly decided to suspend the event.” El Estimulo pointed out that the Church had spent months preparing and planning for the now-canceled event.
“After a rigorous technical and pastoral analysis of the possible locations, we have concluded that it is not feasible to hold the celebration at the Monumental Stadium under the necessary security and capacity conditions,” the Archdiocese’s statement read.
As a result of the cancellation, the Archdiocese called for Caracas’s parishes to instead hold local celebrations with their respective communities in honor of both saints. The Archdiocese explained that 500 stoles, 60,000 communion wafers, and other supplies and Catholic symbols intended to be used in the canceled event have been distributed to parishes in Caracas.
Sunday’s canonization of Saint José Gregorio Hernández, which marks the end of an over 70-year-long process started by the Venezuelan Catholic Church, has become another point of tension between the Church and the Venezuelan socialist regime.
On Monday, dictator Maduro accused Venezuelan Cardinal Baltazar Porras of having conspired, “together with his brotherhood,” to prevent the canonization of Saint Hernández. Days later, on Wednesday, Interior Minister and long suspected drug lord Diosdado Cabello accused Porras of allegedly seeking to “politicize” the canonization.
In reality, Cardinal Porras denounced the “morally unacceptable” situation in Venezuela and denounced the Maduro regime’s ongoing persecution of political dissidents and unjust detention of political prisoners in remarks during an event at the Pontifical Lateran University days before the canonization.
For over two decades, the Venezuelan regime has repeatedly condemned Archbishop Porras for his opposition of the ruling socialists, accusing him of conspiring against the regime. In 2000, late socialist dictator Hugo Chávez accused Porras of carrying “the devil under the cassock.”
In the days leading to the October 19 canonization, the Episcopal Conference of Venezuela released a public letter calling for Maduro to release the almost 900 political prisoners that remain unjustly detained in Venezuela. The priests urged for “measures of clemency that allow those imprisoned for political reasons to regain their freedom” in light of the canonization of the first two Venezuelan saints. The Maduro regime appears to have ignored the request.
On Monday, during the first Mass held at Saint Peter’s Basilica in gratitude for the canonizations, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s Secretary of State, called for the release of the Maduro regime’s political prisoners.
“Only then, dear Venezuela, will you pass from death to life. Only then, dear Venezuela, will your light shine in the darkness, your darkness will become noon if you listen to the words of the Lord who calls you to open unjust prisons, break the bars of the stocks, set the oppressed free, and break all the stocks,” Cardinal Parolin reportedly said.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
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