SAN CRISTóBAL, Mexico—Recent changes in the Mexican hierarchy have come as a blow to proponents of liberation theology— a beleaguered but enduring movement in some sectors of the Latin American Church.

For others in the Diocese of San Cristóbal de las Casas in the impoverished state of Chiapas, the retirement of Bishop Samuel Ruiz García and the surprise transfer of his coadjutor, Bishop Raúl Vera López, to Saltillo is a welcome sign that the local Church will move closer to Pope John Paul II's advocacy for the poor that avoids the rhetoric of class struggle and armed revolution.

While coadjutor bishops usually succeed to the ordinary's position once the see becomes vacant through death or retirement, the Holy Father is always free to chart a different course.

And a different course was the last thing desired by many in the chancery offices of San Cristóbal de las Casas, a diocese that had been led by Bishop Ruiz since before the Second Vatican Council.

Bishop Ruiz, who retired in November at age 75 after almost 40 years in office, was a leading proponent of liberation theology — to the exclusion of many other legitimate Church initiatives, critics have long maintained.

They claim that Bishop Ruiz brought intellectuals from think tanks to train catechists in the latest political theories to prepare them to promote the “social gospel” while prohibiting entry to the diocese to ecclesiastical currents that do not strictly follow this approach.

“For a long time we waited for approval to operate in the diocese and only got evasive answers and delays until we decided to move to the [nearby] Diocese of Tuxtla,” said Humberto Rodríguez of the Christian Family Movement.

Leaders of the lay movement Cursillos de Cristiandad met with a similar refusal. “We were not allowed to enter the Diocese of San Cristóbal, because the bishops [Ruiz and Vera] said that the only thing that works there is their own base communities,” said Bernardo Cantu, Cursillors' Mexican president.

Father Felipe Toussaint, the vicar general and head of the diocesan pastoral council, said he could not recall what led to the denial of the Cursillos movement's request to enter the diocese, and explained that “all major movements, either Cursillos, Apostles of the Word or the Neocatecumenals, are welcomed as long as they maintain a close coordination with the diocese and the parishes.”

He said “the problem is that normally these movements try to create a parallel Church.”

The policy of “close coordination” was not only applied to outside groups. Only militant supporters of liberation theology were tolerated as priests and teachers of the faith, said critics.

A Catholic doctor who has practiced in the diocese for the last 14 years, but who asked not to be identified, told the Register that “most of the priests and catechists in the diocese teach the people about the revolution and that they can take from the rich what they themselves don't have, even by violent means.”

The diocese was the site of an uprising against civil authority by the indigenous-led Zapatista National Liberation Army that began Jan. 1, 1994.

A businessman who regularly travels within the diocese who also asked not to be identified reported, “several small farms have been invaded by indigenous people because priests and catechists promote that.”

He added: “As a consequence, in some of those towns, about 50% of the population have become Adventists or Jehovah's Witnesses because they feel abandoned by the priests,” and desire to live more spiritual, Christ-centered lives.

Tight Control

This tight control over the doctrinal positions of the clergy and Church personnel was confirmed by a 76-year-old American priest.

“In 1990, Bishop Ruiz suspended my faculties for not sharing the doctrinal position he had imposed,” said Father Andrew Lockett, who worked in the town of San Andrés Larrainzar for 28 years. “He didn't want to hear me.

“He just said that my faculties would not be returned because I was not willing to change what he called my ‘line,’ which is that of the Pope and the Church,” said Father Lockett, who now works in the neighboring Diocese of Tuxtla.

Another priest, Father Luis Beltran Mijangos, said he was suspended in 1995 “for not supporting the Zapatista guerrilla [movement] and for providing the sacraments to those humble peasants who oppose the highly ideological pastoral approach of the diocese.”

Father Mijangos, a native of San Cristóbal and one of the last priests to be trained in Chiapas before Bishop Ruiz closed the local seminary in the 1970s, said his problems began in 1980 when he criticized the bishop for ousting priests who were critical of liberation theology.

“I still do what [the diocese] doesn't want to do, which is to provide the sacraments to those peasants and native communities opposed to the official pastoral line,” he said.

According to Father Mijangos, despite Bishop Ruiz and the chancery's claim that their approach brings the Church closer to the indigenous people, many communities have been in rebellion against the diocese because of Bishop Ruiz.

While he was reluctant to discuss individual cases of priests who came into conflict with the diocese, Father Toussaint acknowledged that Father Lockett was removed because of “problems he had with … catechists formed by the women religious of the diocese.”

He also celebrate Masses in the chapel of his home without authorization which led to the loss of his faculties, said the vicar general.

Preaching Propaganda

The divisions in the diocese are also evident in urban areas.

“Many people who are good Catholics pray at home or in Chaman Square near City Hall, because they don't want to hear all the political propaganda delivered by the priests in church,” Ana María Rivera, a leader of a lay group in the city of San Cristóbal told the Register.

“We are trying to follow God, but [Bishops Ruiz and Vera] never receive us; we only get closed doors in the diocese,” she said.

When the Vatican appointed Bishop Vera López as coadjutor in 1995, it was widely assumed that he was being tapped to help bring a new focus to San Cristóbal. It is reliably reported that the apostolic nuncio in Mexico at the time, Archbishop Girolamo Prigione, told Bishop Vera, a Dominican: “Remember, you must be a Dominicanis,” a Latin play on words that sounds like Dominican but means “God's hound.”

According to some, Bishop Vera's position on the prevailing thinking in the diocese evolved from a critical stance to an ambiguous one and, finally, to one of open support for Bishop Ruiz's policies.

Diocesan officials who were initially hostile to Bishop Vera became friendlier and more supportive over time, eventually coming to see the coadjutor as the unexpected guarantor of a continuation of Bishop Ruiz's policies.

The working relationship had become close enough that, over several months in 1999, Bishop Ruiz traveled the diocese with Bishop Vera to introduce “the new bishop.” The tour was noted by the present apostolic nuncio, Archbishop Justo Mullor, who last September reminded both bishops that knowledge of “when Bishop Samuel Ruiz will be replaced and by whom is an exclusive prerogative of the Holy Father.”

New Assignment

Few saw the comments as a premonition of what would be announced by the nuncio's office on Dec. 30: Bishop Vera, 54, would replace 78-year-old retiring Bishop Francisco Villalobos Padilla in the Diocese of Saltillo.

Archbishop Mullor energetically rejected suggestions that the Mexican government had put pressure on the Vatican to remove Bishop Vera from San Cristóbal and said the reasons for the move are “purely Church related.”

Bishop Ruiz and his staff reacted with anger. “I will obey, but I am upset and frustrated,” said Bishop Ruiz.

Father Toussaint said the decision “profoundly challenges our faith and our sense of Church.”

Bishops Ruiz and Vera also signed a joint statement accusing the Vatican of making the decision based on “serious information gaps.”

But this was rejected by the other two bishops in the Chiapas region: Felipe Arizmendi Esquivel of Tapachula, and Tuxtla's Felipe Aguirre Franco. “Pope John Paul's decision was neither arbitrary nor misinformed, but taken after a careful examination,” said the bishops in a joint statement.

While much of the diocese's internal establishment is disappointed, many Catholics were encouraged by the move. “We were absolutely discouraged with the idea of waiting for another 20 years,” said Ana María Rivera. “But now we realize that the Holy Father has not forgotten us.”

She added: “We are now expecting a new springtime for the Church in San Cristóbal.”

Observers speculate that Bishop Ruiz and his aides are now trying to figure out how to persuade the Vatican to force the appointment of a successor in accord with their point of view.

“But the mood is gloomy, because they never expected the Vatican would have the nerve to change the coadjutor,” said a Church employee who asked not to be identified. “They worry that it signals the Vatican's resolve to appoint a bishop who will change everything.”

Alejandro Bermudez writes from Lima, Peru.