One Catholic leader mixed a heavy dose of politics into the spiritual message he offered yesterday those who made the pilgrimage to Cartago, east of San José, to pay homage to the country's patron saint on Our Lady of the Angles Day.
Angel San Casimiro, the bishop of the Alajuela province, asked those gathered at the Cartago basilica to show tolerance and respect to people with different views on the divisive Central American Free-Trade Agreement with the United States (CAFTA), which the country will vote on in a referendum Oct. 7.
“Costa Rica is facing a grand dilemma,” Casimiro said.
Costa Ricans should “be careful because the country will not have a future if we believe that those who think differently than us are our enemies,” he said, calling for the country to eventually look beyond the result of this election and build a more inclusive country, remembering “that the base of democracy is tolerance.”
President Oscar Arias, who listened to Casimiro's speech, echoed his message of the need for Costa Ricans to unite.
“On Oct. 7 we will vote in a referendum that has dangerously divided the country and, as Evangelicals say, ‘no house that is divided amongst itself will prevail.' We have to unite not in favor of one option or the other on paper, but in favor of Costa Rican democracy,” he said.
Costa Ricans will vote on CAFTA in a popular referendum Oct. 7; if 40% of eligible voters turn out, the results of the vote will be binding. Costa Rica is the only signatory country that has not ratified this controversial trade pact.
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