What Did the Cardinal Say About Santería?

Last week a group of santería practitioners filed a complaint against Cardinal Jorge Urosa Savino, alleging that he had violated the article of the National Constitution that protects freedom of worship and religion. In response, the Archdiocese of Caracas published a full transcript of his remarks on the incompatibility between the Catholic religion and santería. In them, while respecting people of other religions, the Cardinal invites Catholics to keep their faith, because a person cannot be Catholic and profess another religion at the same time.

At no point did the Cardinal offend santería practitioners, much less trample on freedom of worship or religion. Here is the substance of what he said, in a video just under three minutes long, at the Basilica of Santa Teresa in Caracas on Holy Wednesday, April 4.

He told the faithful that we cannot be santeros and Catholics at once. People who are weak in their faith may be fooled into thinking they can, he said, but you cannot be two opposite things at the same time. Santería is a religion completely different from the Catholic religion, and whoever wants to follow Jesus Christ cannot also believe in the orishas or the babalawos. Our religion, he explained, is founded on the historical person of Jesus Christ, the Divine Nazarene, who died for us on the Cross and rose again, and who is the one and only name in which we can receive forgiveness of sins and salvation. We cannot have two gods, he said; there is one God, the One and Triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and Jesus Christ is very firm about this: we cannot follow God and other gods.

He added that he has great respect for people of other religions, but that those who belong to another religion cannot be Catholic, and that Catholics cannot go off and follow a different religion, just as they cannot believe in María Lionza or in spiritism, or be Catholic and Protestant at the same time.

He concluded that one cannot be Catholic and santero at once, and that when we have a religion so great, beautiful and extraordinary, a religion of salvation, of the affirmation of life and of the Eternal Love the Lord wants to share with us, we cannot go off and follow a different one. That, he said, is extremely important.

So I ask myself: why this reaction against our Cardinal for remarks that were truly respectful and did nothing more than clarify the truth for some Catholics who, perhaps out of ignorance, had no idea that one cannot be a santero and a Catholic at the same time? Where in these words is freedom of worship and religion being attacked?

I invite the hundreds of thousands of faithful Catholics who live in our country and fill our churches (more crowded every day) to learn what santería really is, so that no one can lead them down other paths. It is very important for us Catholics to study our Catholic Faith, so that we have firmer foundations on which to build an exemplary Christian life that follows the Way of Jesus Christ and no other, and so that we can tell Truth and Goodness apart and no one can deceive us.

And above all so that, as the Cardinal says, we understand and savor that our Catholic religion, founded on the person of Jesus Christ, is a great, beautiful and extraordinary religion of salvation and of the Eternal Love the Lord wants to share with us and wants us to follow. That way we will not mix things up, and we can be truly exemplary Catholics who worship Our Lord Jesus Christ alone.