What have become of promised plans to discuss Brazil’s ‘secret’ Vatican concordat?

By
Barry Duke
– September 15, 2009Posted in: Catholic Church, censorship, Religion in politics, The Freethinker

THIS summer it was revealed that Brazil would hold congressional hearings on a Vatican concordat it signed last November. According to Scots writer and secularist Muriel Fraser the decision thwarted attempts by the Brazilian Bishops’ Conference to have the agreement rushed to a vote under an emergency procedure for urgent matters of national defence.

But since Fraser reported on what many describe as a “stealth” agreement designed by the Vatican to undermine Brazil’s secular status, nothing more seems to have been reported on the concordat, which was signed in 2008.

This is not entirely surprising, as secrecy has shrouded the signing of the concordat since Day 1.

Brazilian Journalist Alberto Dines has described the performance of the media as a “news embargo or self-censorship”. He claims that the agreement was kept confidential because it violates the letter and spirit of the Federal Constitution.

Pope Ratzinger pictured in his private Vatican City library with Brazilian President Luiz Ignacio Lula da Silva and First Lady Marisa Leticia Lula da Silva.

Pope Ratzinger pictured in his private Vatican City library with Brazilian President Luiz Ignacio Lula da Silva and First Lady Marisa Leticia Lula da Silva.

Dines hosted a TV debate on the issue back in November, 2008. One panellist was Roseli Fischmann, a researcher and professor at the University of São Paulo, who said that:

The secular state has the duty to preserve the right of all, regardless of the number of people who choose certain belief.

He added that Brazil had a rich religious pluralism. Therefore, an international agreement with a single religion was unacceptable.

But lawyers for National Conference of Brazilian Bishop insist that the treaty was not signed with the Catholic Church but with the Holy See which is a sovereign state. If, for historical reasons, other religions have no legal standing in Private International Law, they cannot conclude international treaties.

The Concordat story began, according to Fraser, with the announcement in last November that Brazil’s President Luiz (“Lula”) da Silva would be stopping by the Vatican “on the way to Washington”. However, this turned out to be more than a courtesy call. Once there, the President was ushered into the Vatican’s “Treaty Room” where he signed a concordat. The Brazilian Government at first dismissed it as an “administrative agreement”. In the words of a Brazilian editor

There were hugs, there were blessings, there were pictures – but no statement on what was dealt with between the President and the Pontiff.

Critics note that this agreement appears to be a wedge which finds pretexts to introduce a number of basic legal principles that undermine the secular state.

* The concordat imports foreign law into Brazil by stipulating that Canon (or Church) Law be used in Catholic institutions. Because this includes Church-run social services, concordats act to impose Canon Law on both their lay employees and their clients. In Germany this is a widespread problem, particularly acute for anyone, like gays or the divorced, whose private life does not accord with Canon Law.

* The concordat also acts as a foot in the door to proselytise children in state schools. In Poland it only took twenty years for the establishment of voluntary unpaid catechism in state schools to be transformed bit by bit into lessons in Catholic doctrine which, in much of the country, has become effectively compulsory, is now paid for by the state and even counts in the grade average.

* The agreement commits Brazil to huge payments to the Vatican. It obligates the Brazilian taxpayer to subsidise Church schools, to underwrite Catholic charities and to maintain Church buildings. At the same time it grants the Catholic Church unspecified tax immunity and even certain exemptions from Brazilian labour laws which could be expanded. In Germany the Church maintains quite explicitly that under God’s roof there is no fundamental contradiction between the interests of the employer and employees. Therefore there are virtually no wage agreements with unions, and, of course, no right to strike.

* The Brazilian concordat ends with the infamous clause that any differences regarding it “are to be settled by direct diplomatic negotiations”. This sounds innocent, but it is not. It means that there’s no appeal to the Constitution and no redress through Brazilian courts. Brazil would have to negotiate with the Vatican and seek its agreement.

One country actually tried this. In 2006 a Hungarian cabinet minister went to the Vatican to try to renegotiate the Finance Concordat. There he found that no one had time to talk to him. This is precisely why concordats customarily snap shut with the “mousetrap clause”.

Wrote Fraser:

It’s not known how the Vatican managed to get the Brazilian President to sign this stealth concordat. Lula was a union organiser who bravely stood up to the former military dictatorship. This man of action may be simply unable to recognise a creeping dictatorship which is brought about by documents, not guns.

You can find more information at Concordat Watch.

Hat Tip: Ricardo



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