To the Unknown Pope – Folha de S. Paulo, October 14, 1978
by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira
I am writing on Thursday. The conclave will begin Saturday afternoon. How many days will it take to choose the new pope? Who will the new pope be? This question seems to grow more enigmatic.
Even before we know who he will be, I wish to address him with a plea, because the magnitude of what I am about to ask transcends the personal circumstances of whoever may be elected. I am therefore writing to the unknown pope.
My request can be summarized in a few sentences:
“Holy Father, in today’s world, Brazil is the country with the largest Catholic population. The civil unity of this enormous religious bloc is a fundamental factor in enabling it to fully fulfill its Christian vocation among nations. Now, this unity is threatened.
“A single gesture on your part will suffice to save it. Make this gesture in the first days after your election. It will be the glorious opening of your pontificate.”
“Holy Father, avert the danger threatening Brazil’s unity.”
As can be seen, it matters little what the future pontiff’s nationality is, whether he is a diocesan bishop or a cardinal of the Curia. My plea is such that, to be well received, it is enough that he simply be pope.
The difficult part is not making this request but explaining why.
In the second half of January this year, 52 missionaries from fourteen prelatures and dioceses gathered in Manaus and issued an extensive declaration on “the calamitous situation in which numerous indigenous peoples of the region find themselves, dispossessed of their lands and cultures, especially by the greed of powerful landowners.” The quoted passage appears in L’Osservatore Romano (February 19, weekly edition in Portuguese).
The Vatican’s unofficial newspaper continues:
“The January issue of the CNBB’s Monthly Bulletin will publish the full text of this important Declaration, as well as the Conclusions of the Course [held by those missionaries on indigenous issues], from which we highlight here the title ‘Self-determination’: Indigenous groups have the right to self-determination, already enshrined in so many international charters signed by Brazil, and their members have the right to be recognized as responsible persons. We recognize that the Indian has special rights that predate our legal system. We endorse the decision made by the indigenous people present at our course: ‘To fight for self-determination; we will achieve self-determination for the indigenous people even if we are subjected to imprisonment and massacres.’”
I am by no means an expert on indigenous and missionary issues. Therefore, I do not know whether the term “self-determination” has a specific meaning in the subject’s terminology. In everyday language, also used by readers of L’Osservatore and Folha de São Paulo, it denotes a nation’s right to decide its own destiny. It is equivalent to sovereignty. In a more restricted sense, it can also refer to the autonomy of an ethnic, regional, or cultural group within the political whole in which it is embedded. Thus, one could speak of an obviously limited “self-determination” of states or provinces within a federation, or even of municipalities within a state or province.
The question immediately arises: what do the Declaration’s missionary authors mean by “self-determination”? Are they seeking autonomy for indigenous groups or sovereignty?
The truly crazy second hypothesis seems strikingly consistent with the context. As we have seen, the Declaration alludes to “the right to self-determination already enshrined in so many international charters signed by Brazil.” The reference to “international charters” suggests sovereignty, as that is their primary focus.
The subsequent words seem to follow the same line of thought, presenting our highly diverse indigenous peoples as a single “indigenous people.” A nation, one might say, willing to claim its “self-determination” with the characteristic “animus” of a subjugated people fighting for independence. The missionaries say they want such “self-determination” for the “indigenous people,” even if they are subjected to “imprisonment and massacres.” It is difficult to read these words without thinking of an indigenous secession war led by progressive and leftist priests and nuns.
As bewildering as all this may be, the rest of the 52 missionaries’ Declaration conveys the same impression.
They argue that the Indians should constitute, outside the Brazilian representative regime, a system of their own, with “tribal, regional, and national indigenous assemblies and their participation in international meetings.” In other words, a kind of intertribal indigenous democracy in which non-indigenous Brazilians are not represented.
According to the Declaration, power within each indigenous tribe will emanate from the tribe itself. It will not be secular (as the Brazilian State unfortunately is), but religious-fetishistic. For “in the interest of self-determination,” the Declaration seeks to have “the authority of indigenous chiefs, shamans, and other religious leaders and elders, within their social and family concepts” recognized.
In other words, each tribe would be a small, more or less monarchical or democratic unit with pronounced theocratic features.
Naturally, each piece of this tribal mosaic would evolve (if at all) only in response to its own peculiarities, with little attention to the rest of Brazil’s political and socioeconomic landscape. This is all the more so because, in order to ensure self-determination, the Declaration calls for “the missions to be the first to break, in practice, with the regime of guardianship to which they have subjected the Indians.”
The most curious thing is that, while breaking with the “regime of guardianship,” the missionaries are asking for “special guardianship” not from the executive branch, toward which they are hostile and aggressive, but from the legislative branch, which should have a permanent “Indian Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry” (CPI) to “oversee” the Presidency. This is a privilege that no other class or sector of Brazilians has.
Once again, we come to self-determination, for the Indians would constitute in Brazil a privileged body that is at least semi-foreign, and their situation would be better than that of all Brazilians.
The looseness of the connection with Brazil is fully revealed in this demand: “International entities, such as the UN Human Rights Commission, should be regularly informed of crimes committed against indigenous populations.” This would mean that the UN would function as a vast international CPI, permanently overseeing the Brazilian Legislative CPI, which in turn would oversee the Executive Branch.
The UN… We all know what that means. All that is needed is for the nations of the communist world to take an interest in this at the time of voting, so they vote to recognize the most implausible crimes as proven. And to obtain a majority in the UN, they will engage in bargaining. Brezhnev could trade in a slander against Brazil as one trades a chicken or a fish at a market.
Who does not realize that the missionary demands are opening landing points for the Russian boot in the middle of the Amazon jungle? The boot or the boots? How many boots? Hundreds? Thousands? How many thousands?
The unknown pope could put an end to all this in an instant by framing the defense of indigenous rights in terms that do not reflect Brazil’s depredation.
Frankly, I doubt that anything quick and practical can be done without his consent.
So I turn to him with my afflictions, prayers, and hopes, but they are not mine alone.
