VENEZUELAN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN THE BOLIVARIAN

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 CARACAS 002032 SIPDIS SIPDIS NSC FOR DFISK AND DTOMLINSON E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/07/2031 TAGS: PGOV PHUM SCUL VE SUBJECT: VENEZUELAN RELIGIOUS EDUCATION IN THE BOLIVARIAN CRUCIBLE REF: A. CARACAS 01787 ¶B. CARACAS 00123 CARACAS 00002032 001.2 OF 003 Classified By: Robert Richard Downes, Political Counselor, for Reason 1.4(b). -------------- Summary -------------- ¶1. (C) Catholic education may be dramatically scaled back if the new education law is passed. The new law will cut out traditional religious training in public schools and private religious schools, the latter as part of the broader Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela's (BRV) campaign against non-government controlled private education. The BRV argues it is a matter of maintaining state neutrality, but Catholic leaders fear an ulterior motive of supplanting the values in this majority Catholic society with those of the Bolivarian Revolution. The Church and BRV have intermittent discussions over the draft law, and Church leaders remain positive a compromise can be worked out. There is also a possibility that the BRV will try to cut a deal with the Church in order to win passage of the bill, which aims to gain control over the entire education sector. The clash between Church and State on this issue is inevitable, though it will probably not peak until next year. End summary. ¶2. (C) Poloff met separately with a cross-section of stakeholders on the religious education issue -- Leonardo Carvajal, head of the pro-opposition group Asamblea de Educadores (Assembly of Educators) on May 24; Octavio Delamo, president of the Chamber of Private Schools, on May 26; Deputy Luis Acuna, chairman of the National Assembly Education Committee, on June 1; and Brother Anton Marquiegui, president of the Venezuelan Catholic Education Association (AVEC),on June 1 -- to discuss the education bill now before the Assembly (see ref a for more details on the education bill). -------------- -------------- Background -- A History of Church-State Cooperation -------------- -------------- ¶3. (U) Venezuelan law passed in 1980 permits religious education training in public schools (up to the sixth grade) for two hours of the school week when so requested by parents. In 1991, AVEC signed an agreement with the Venezuelan government to create public servant positions called "religious training coordinators" to facilitate such 
training. Monks, nuns, and other lay persons served as catechists, receiving a small stipend from the state for their services. (Note: While this cable focuses on Catholic education, the Evangelicals face similar though smaller-scale issues -- they signed a similar agreement on religious training in 1993.) AVEC leaders said this religious training is not intended to proselytize but rather to teach broad societal values along Catholic lines. ¶4. (C) In addition to religious training in private schools, the Catholic Church operates 765 private religious schools totaling 495,916 students, or nine percent of all students in Venezuela (as of March). Under a 1993 agreement with the State, 588 of these schools, mostly in poor areas, are heavily subsidized (85 percent) by the government. According to Church leaders, the BRV has kept current on these payments, though the agreement is up for renewal this year. Marquiegui described the state support of schools as one of necessity because the government had been unable to administer schools in these poor areas. He pointed out that Fe y Alegria (Faith and Happiness),a Jesuit-run program to set up schools "where the asphalt doesn't reach," operates many subsidized schools where the government is not able. CARACAS 00002032 002.2 OF 003 ¶5. (C) Marquiegui said the current row over religious education is Venezuelan history repeating itself. He said the Catholic Church and religious schools suffered greatly under the Accion Democratica (AD) "trienio," the period from 1945-48 when the communist-influenced AD party ruled Venezuela. The Bolivarians, he said, are trying the same strategy with their efforts to reduce the influence of the Church among the young. -------------- A Secular State? -------------- ¶6. (C) Venezuelan law guarantees freedom of religion and the Bolivarian Constitution guarantees parents the right to provide religious training for children (Art. 59). Minister of Education Aristobulo Isturiz told reporters May 20 this right implicitly means that schools should not have any part in religious training. He argued that it is an unfair burden to the State if it had to provide training in the many religions present in Venezuela (Comment: A rhetorical argument since currently only Catholics and Evangelicals provide such training). Carvajal told Poloff the traditional model in Venezuelan education has been "secular, not confessional," in which religious training is treated as an elective activity and the state does not, for example, decide on the content of religion classes. Isturiz' interpretation, Carvajal said, essentially creates an "atheist model" whereby all religion is stripped from the classroom. Fifth Republic Movement (MVR) Deputy and author of the education bill Luis Acuna objected, saying that the state recognizes that "the spiritual" is a legitimate component of education. That said, the state is secular and no one, Church or State, wants religion incorporated into curriculum, he asserted. -------------- The New Law -------------- ¶7. (C) The education bill enshrines the Bolivarian interpretation of the issue with language that families have the right and responsibility to teach religion to the their children. The most immediate change would be to eliminate religious training from schools even if, as the current law permits, parents request it. The State, the bill says, must maintain its secular nature and freedom from the influence of religious entities. This may sound consistent with U.S. jurisprudence on church-state relations, but it is a fundamental shift for Catholic Venezuela. Catholic leaders have publicly denounced the bill for that reason, arguing that it is exactly the wrong time for Venezuelans to turn their backs on religious education given soaring crime rates and worsening polarization within society. -------------- Whither Private Religious Schools? -------------- ¶8. (C) As reported in ref, the BRV is actively attempting, in the opinion of private school chamber head Octavio Delamo, to suffocate slowly all private education in Venezuela by controlling tuition increases. The BRV, for example, passed a resolution June 29 that caps tuition increases at 15 percent for the second year in a row, well below the 40 percent sought by private schools. The education bill, however, is silent on the question of funding for private religious schools; funding mechanisms are still based on BRV agreements with AVEC. The tuition cap decree, of course, currently applies to non-subsidized religious schools, though it is not clear what the impact on subsidized religious schools will be. ¶9. (C) Senior Catholic leadership raises the religious education issue with their interlocutors. Pope Benedict XVI CARACAS 00002032 003.2 OF 003 even raised it with Chavez on May 11. In a lunch with the Ambassador May 25, Archbishop of Maracaibo and President of the Venezuelan Episcopal Conference Ubaldo Santana expressed hope that the Church would reach an accommodation with the government. Papal Nuncio Giacinto Berlocco was less optimistic, however, and believed the BRV would eventually pare back significantly religious content in public education. Delamo told poloff there was a fear that the BRV would bargain with the Church in an effort to drive a wedge between opponents of the new education bill, leaving non-religious private schools to fight on their own. -------------- Comment -------------- ¶10. (C) The Bolivarians are proceeding steadily on this issue, but it appears the BRV will defer action on the bill until after the December presidential elections in hopes of dodging a politically explosive issue. There are few discernible tenets to the confused Bolivarian ideology, but a recurring theme is the need to form "new citizens." Clearly, the Bolivarians view Venezuela's conservative Catholic Church, one of the few remaining independent institutions, as a threat to that objective. More immediately, however, the BRV may enjoy trimming the sails of the Church, which maintains much higher credibility with the public and is a consistent critic of Chavez and his policies. BROWNFIELD