Report from Venezuela
Ellner, Steve
who traces his line of succession through a Bishop Kieran Broadberry, who was episcopally ordained at the age of seventeen by Bishop Clemente Gomez, who now describes himself as Pope Gregory...
...Ch~vez advocates convoking a constituent assembly in which the organizations of civil society (such as neighborhood and professional associations) would play a major role in drafting a new constitution...
...Ordinand and cleric alike believe that the ceremony, though unlawful, was valid...
...Steve Ellner, a previous contributor to Commonweal, teaches economic history at the Universidad de Oriente in Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela...
...Nor is she without support in Ireland, where traditionally there are wellsprings of sympathy for people who challenge established authority in the pursuit of apparently hopeless causes...
...There are, nonetheless, aspects of what has happened which should at least give pause to proponents of the ordination of women...
...The groundswell in favor of Ch~vez puts the lie to neoliberalism's favorite postulate about the "end of history...
...In private, however, influential business and diplomatic circles in the United States (such as former ambassador Ambler Moss, now at the University of Miami), are fearful that Washington will be left in the cold should Ch~vez become president...
...A U.S...
...foreign policy...
...The activist state envisioned by Chavez is a response to nearly two decades of economic instability and crisis in Venezuela, much as the New Deal was a response to the Great Depression...
...Ch~vez's short political career has been marked by bold initiatives...
...The United States has good reason to be uneasy about Ch~ivez...
...Chavez's adversaries attribute the freeze of foreign investment and capital flight to the "Ch~ivez effect...
...Sometime between late 1997, when he took in 5 percent at the polls, and his present ranking which has edged toward 50 percent, CMvez surpassed the front-runner, exMiss Universe Irene S~ez...
...But sympathetic Congressman Carlos Melo told me "Ch~vez comes off as anything but an overbearing leftist or authoritarian military officer...
...For his part, Pat Buckley has said that he will ordain a further four priests--all men--for his newly formed Society of Saint Andrew...
...Neoliberalism means government withdrawal from the economy, leaving the nation's economic fate to the private sector...
...Chavez, Saez, and the two other candidates now with the most popular support began their presidential bids virtually without party backing, a telling comment on the bankruptcy of Venezuela's political parties...
...Regardless of whether the United States likes such proposals, it should recognize that, following nearly two decades of poor economic performance, they have struck a responsive chord in Venezuela...
...Such policies are a far cry from the despotic plots which Chavez's adversaries accuse him of devising...
...But Ch~vez's candidacy demonstrates that a neoliberal consensus has not emerged in Venezuela...
...Steve Ellner REPORT FROM VENEZUELA Beating back neoliberalism t is possible that when Madeleine Albright and other State Department officials first spoke harshly of Venezuelan presidential candidate "Commander" Hugo Ch~ivez last spring, they had no idea he would become the nation's front-runner in this December's elections...
...Ch~vez's personal style has served to calm some fears regarding his alleged despotic intentions...
...And recent advice from J.P...
...His most recent report in Commonweal was "No Melting Pot" (September 25...
...Political commentator Andr6s Galdo, who hardly sympathizes with Ch~vez, has warned that the "Stop-Ch~vez Campaign'--in which Ch~vez's rivals are uniting and aggressively concentrating their fire against him--could create an atmosphere conducive to electoral fraud, assassination, or a coup...
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...They argue that a U.S...
...At best, she is an unlikely successor to Mary Magdalene, described in medieval homilies as "the apostle of the apostles...
...The line of episcopal ordination from Vietnam to Dublin is certainly questionable, insofar as it relies for its justification primarily on the contention that an exercise of sacramental authority may be valid even if unlawful...
...spokesman stated that Ch~vez's coup attempt six years earlier against the government of Carlos Andr6s P6rez had "dishonored" the Venezuelan armed forces, although the spokesman failed to explain why countless other military coup leaders have merited more cordial treatment...
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...The abortive coup he staged on February 4,1992 against President P6rez pitted middle-level officers like himself against the military establishment...
...It is true that Venezuela's minuscule Communist party endorses Ch~vez and that his two top campaign advisors are leftists...
...There is no doubt that Frances Meigh's ordination has attracted an extraordinary amount of publicity--she told the London Guardian with "childlike glee" that she had given more than sixty media interviews, and has a list of well-wishers that includes such unlikely bedfellows as Chief Buthelezi of South Africa and Tony Benn, the former British Labor Cabinet minister...
...This proposal points in the direction of an innovative model in which the masses are better represented in government...
...Church sources maintain both that the episcopal line which has emerged in Father Buckley is theologically tainted, and that in any case, as Pope John Paul II and Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger have insisted, the church has no power to ordain women, even if it wanted to do so...
...He pledges not to revoke the recent contract privatizing steel in Venezuela, even though he opposed relinquishing state control of this "strategic" sector of the economy...
...Saturday 10-5 Phone: 212/535-4050 _9 Toll-free: 888/311-8949 Fax: 212/535-4052 " E-mail: para@cybernex.net www: http://www2.cybernex.net/- para/public/ but it set in motion street protests that culminated in P6rez's removal from office the following year...
...declaration pledging active support for whoever wins the December election would send a clear message, particularly important given Venezuela's forty years of relatively stable, competitive democracy--a South American record...
...The neoliberal approach in Latin America has translated into polarization between the rich and the poor, and the absence of a strong state apparatus to cushion the impact of globalism (NAFTA-type arrangements which inundate the nation with foreign merchandise...
...By declaring "I consider myself a humanist, and a humanist has to be anti-neoliberal," Ch~vez has challenged a cornerstone of U.S...
...The coup was immediately denounced by parties across the political spectrum, n Commonweal | II October23, 1998 A month-long sale at The Paraclete Book Center your source for the finest theological writing for more than 47years...
...John Horgan teaches journalism at the Dublin City University...
...Commonweal | 2 October 23,1998...
...For years, political parties here, greased by Venezuela's oilderived revenue, have dominated the political scene, performing favors for their members but not taking into account the nation's collective interests...
...He added that Chavez quotes Pope John Paul II, the Bible, and various outstanding nineteenth-century Venezuelans...
...Furthermore, his success has originated not from intellectuals, political parties, or the mass media, but from ordinary Venezuelans...
...According to that notion, there are no genuine alternatives to liberal democracy coupled with a laissez-faire economy...
...who traces his line of succession through a Bishop Kieran Broadberry, who was episcopally ordained at the age of seventeen by Bishop Clemente Gomez, who now describes himself as Pope Gregory XVII, and who was ordained some years ago by a formerly orthodox but subsequently dissident Vietnamese bishop...
...at worst, her wellmeaning actions may further reinforce Vatican attempts to tie the hands of future popes on this most controversial of issues...
...And while it is true that normal Catholic episcopal ordinations tend to muffle, at the very least, the New Testament concept of the "election" of bishops, the ceremony at which Pat Buckley was consecrated, and the ordination of Frances Meigh at which he subsequently presided, were redolent of a type of essentialist 1950s theology in which power and ceremony provided the leitmotif...
...In April, the State Department turned down Ch~ivez's request to visit the United States to meet with multinational representatives...
...Chavez's rise is also significant for what it says about economic and political conditions in Latin America...
...Antineoliberals like Ch~vez have offered foreign capital guarantees, while eschewing intransigent positions...
...Morgan and Moody-that investors think twice before purchasing Venezuelan government bonds--has added fuel to the fire...
...That provision was originally devised as a protection for lay people, rather than as a way in which clergy could take power to themselves without the need for accountability...
...For the time being, therefore, it is likely that the battle will continue to be fought more on the question of chromosomes than on the aspects of canon law involved in Frances Meigh's ordination...
...Ch~vez laughed off the visa d e nial and said that he would apply for a MasterCard instead...
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Vol. 125 • October 1998 • No. 18
