Politicians court Catholic Church favour

Mexico's political landscape more open to Church but still has bumps

People visit a statue of Blessed John Paul II outside the Cathedral of Our Most Holy Mother of Light in Leon, Mexico. Pope Benedict XVI will visit Leon during his late March trip to Mexico and Cuba.

Here is a Catholic News Service story which gives hope to Catholics in places where they suffer persecution.

When Pope John Paul II touched down in Mexico for the first time in 1979, he arrived in a deeply Catholic country estranged from the Vatican, with rules prohibiting priests from wearing priestly dress in public and forbidding the Church to own property.

When Pope Benedict XVI arrives in Mexico March 23, he'll find a country casting aside the old anti-clerical provisions, where the Vatican is now recognized and politicians and political parties openly court Church favour.

For full story see The B.C. Catholic website.