Sánchez attacks the bishops because they believe that a question of trust, censorship or elections suits Spain

This Sunday, the Government launched an offensive against the president of the Episcopal Conference, Luis Argüello, said in an interview with The avant-garde that he sees only three ways out of the current “blockade” of institutions: “a question of confidence, a motion of censure or giving citizens a voice” during elections.

Then, the Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, sent a letter this morning to the president of the Episcopal Conference, in which he accuses him of “breaking the political neutrality of the Church” for his interview with The avant-gardeand demands that “refrain” from making these types of “partisan statements”.

In his writing that Moncloa sent to the Efe agency, Bolaños interprets that Argüello wants the “end of the current government.”

And he speculates that surely He would feel much more comfortable with an executive from “the right and the extreme right”.who would be “more understanding towards the positions of his organization”, he said about the Episcopal Conference.

“I expressly ask you not to break your political neutrality and act with respect for democracy and government“, indicates the letter from Bolaños sent to the president of the Episcopal Conference, reproduced by the Efe agency.

He also criticizes the head of the bishops who, in his interview with The avant-gardespeak of “The Valley of the Fallen”, without taking into account the fact that after the entry into force of the Law on Democratic Memory, it is now officially called “Valley of Cuelgamuros” by decision of the Government.

Concretely, Bishop Argüello deplored in the interview that “in recent months, relations with the government have been marked by only two issues: the Valley of the Fallen and reparation to victims of ecclesial pedophilia abuse“.

“To our great regret,” he added, because the bishops would have liked to address other “crucial” issues with the government, such as “education, which is constantly called into question and on which a state pact is necessary.”

To questions from Enric Juliana, the head of the Episcopal Conference showed himself convinced that he is not breaking “any neutrality” with his declarations: “I respond by referring to the Constitution and the mechanisms it provides” to escape the current situation of political “blockade”.

Minister Félix Bolaños also spoke about the controversy on the X network: “We ask the Episcopal Conference for political neutrality and that hide your love for PPVox a little” he wrote

For his part, the Archbishop of Tarragona, Joan Planellas, warned the president of the Episcopal Conference that he must be more “cautious” when speaking “in the name of the Church or in the name of the different pastors of the Church.”

Planellas considered that Archbishop Argüello’s words could conflict with the Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et Spes of the Second Vatican Council, according to which “the Church cannot identify with any specific political option and is not linked to any political system.”

However, the Archbishop of Tarragona recognized that “the political situation is more blocked than last July, with a legislative body without budgets and with a much weaker government and a much more precarious situation.”

The head of the Catalan bishops also disgraced Argüello because, when speaking of the Constitution, he assumes that “the Spanish nation is the one that possesses sovereignty”, without taking into account “the existence of the Catalan nation, which requires an adequate legal-political structure that makes viable the national rights that Catalonia has”.

Other ministers and leaders of the PSOE joined this offensive and echoed the words spoken by Pedro Sánchez in Cáceres.

“As a woman of the progressive Church, I ask the president of the Episcopal Conference to apostatize whoever can make him do it,” wrote Vice President María Jesús Montero.

The head of the Treasury thus suggested that Bishop Argüello had limited himself to supporting the call launched by former President Aznar to overthrow the current government.

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