Lay council reminds Venezuelans that Church has always rejected Communism

Caracas, Venezuela, Sep 20, 2010 / 12:08 pm

The National Council of the Laity in Venezuela has called on Venezuelans to carefully consider each candidate and their positions as they prepare to vote for members of Congress on September 26.  The council stressed that the Church has always rejected totalitarian ideologies such as Communism.

“We must remember: The Church has rejected the totalitarian and atheist ideologies associated with ‘Communism’ in the modern times,” the council said, citing the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

The elections for Venezuela’s National Assembly and for the representatives for the Latin American Parliament are an opportunity to exercise the right and duty to vote, which the Church’s social doctrine promotes, it continued.

The council then recalled John Paul II's words in “Centesimus Annus,” which said, “…it is preferable that each power be balanced by other powers and by other spheres of responsibility which keep it within proper bounds. This is the principle of the 'rule of law,' in which the law is sovereign, and not the arbitrary will of individuals.”

The council stressed that authentic democracy “is more than the formal acceptance of a series of rules, it is also the convinced and active acceptance of values such as the dignity of the person, respect for human rights, the common good as the guiding objective and criteria of public life.”