Saturday, August 20, 2011

Clergy rebels in the land of pope and glory

.THE Reverend Father Eubilio Rodriguez's church is a prefabricated building in a part of this city hard hit by Spain's economic crisis. 

In front of the altar are a few scraggly potted plants. 

Behind it, some plastic chairs.

How, he asks, can the Catholic Church be getting ready for a lavish $US72 million ($A69 million) celebration in Madrid - some of it paid for with tax dollars - when Spain is in the midst of an austerity drive, the unemployment rate for young people is 40 per cent and his parishioners are losing their homes to foreclosure every day?

''It is scandalous, the price,'' he said. ''It is shameful. It discredits the church.'' 

Father Rodriguez, 67, is among the 120 clergymen working among Madrid's poor who have signed a lengthy petition deploring the Pope's visit this week on many grounds - from its cost to what they see as an inappropriate melding of church and state.

Madrid's lamp posts are gaily decorated with banners. 

Retiro Park has been decked out with 200 portable confessional booths. 

But bitter debates are raging over the festivities and the role of the church in Spanish politics.

The priests, along with dozens of left-leaning groups demanding a secular state and young people who occupied many of Spain's main squares for months to protest against the government's handling of the economy, are planning at least one major protest march a day.

About 450,000 have already registered, and three times as many were expected, organisers sais. 

To accommodate their activities - which will include a daylong vigil at the airport, with temperatures likely to reach nearly 40 degrees, and an all-night procession - some of Madrid's main avenues will be closed to traffic for up to six days.

Government and church officials insist the cost to taxpayers will be minimal and the lift to local businesses substantial.

Spain's business community came up with $US23 million to pay for some events and the pilgrims will pay $US44 million themselves. 

Other donations should cover the rest, the officials said.

''The public administration helped us in only two ways,'' said Fernando Gimenez Barriocanal, the financial director of World Youth Day 2011. 

The pilgrims would be allowed to sleep in public buildings, such as schools, and businesses would get tax deductions for their contributions, he said.

Father Rodriguez and others who signed the 10-page petition say the costs are always fuzzy when the Pope comes to town. 

They suspect that the cost of extra security, of collecting rubbish and of stress on health systems will add up to millions.

For one thing, the pilgrims have been granted an 80 per cent discount on public transport, which some find particularly galling because subway fares just went up by 50 per cent. 

The priests are not alone in making such claims.

''They still can't tell us how much the Pope's visit cost two years ago,'' said Esther Lopez Barcelo, youth co-ordinator for the small United Left Party. 

Ms Lopez began a Twitter campaign this month against the Pope's visit.

''Every time he comes here, the figures become opaque,'' she said.

Spain is less solidly Catholic than it once was. 

A government survey released last month found that 71.7 per cent of Spaniards declared themselves Catholic, compared with 82.1 per cent in 2001. 

But the church is eager to keep a spiritual hold on Spain - a country where people can still tick a box diverting a part of their taxes to the church.

A Vatican spokesman said the protests planned against Benedict's visit were ''not worrying or surprising'', particularly because hundreds of thousands of young people would be happy to welcome the Pope. 

''It's part of life in a democratic country,'' he said.