Catholic Bishops Will Only Support TLC If It Has a Social Agenda
Costa Rican Catholic Bishops announced that they will only support the Tratado Libre de Comercio (TLC) - Free Trade Agreement with the United States -  if it includes a complementary "social agenda" dedicated to protecting the poorest sectors of the country.

In a letter sent June 21 to the secretary of the Vatican State, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, a day before his resignation was confirmed, the Costa Rican Bishops reaffirmed their position regarding the TLC.

The document contains an implicit warning to President Oscar Arias that they are willing to act as a collegiate body that does not accept policy pressures from the government.

The letter was signed by Monseñor  José Francisco Ulloa Rojas, diocesan Bishop of Cartago and president of the Costa Rican Bishops' Conference; Monseñor Hugo Barrantes Ureña, metropolitan archbishop of San José and vice-president, as well as by Monseñor Oscar Fernández Guillén, diocesan bishop of Puntarenas and secretary general of the bishop' conference.

Some Catholic sectors in Costa Rica were critical of a visit that President Oscar Arias made to Rome two weeks ago when he accused the bishop of opposing the TLC. After his trip, Arias announced that the Vatican would send a letter to the Costa Rican Bishops so that they support the TLC.

"What Arias did was extremely clumsy and underestimated the power of the Church. What he did was an unprecedented indiscretion, to go to Rome to seek a type of censure against the Costa Rican Bishops' Conference", said the former minister of culture, university professor and former Catholic priest Arnoldo Mora.

Journalist and former Catholic Priest Javier Solis said that Arias' behavior was a "major clumsiness".

"He thinks that because he is president and a Nobel laureate he can twist the arm of the Catholic Church", he said.

Costa Rica is the only Central American country that has not yet ratified the trade agreement with the United States, something that led Arias to seek help from the Pope. However, his move troubled bishops who, rather than aligning themselves with the TLC, reiterated their objections.

The letter from the Bishops to Cardinal Sodano said explicitly that President Arias should understand that there can be no TL with the United States if a "complementary agenda, with legislative projects that guarantee that the weakest sectors compensation for the possible negative effects of the treaty" is not democratically elaborated.

At the same time, they emphasized the need to conform a "social agenda" materialized in a body of laws that promotes and help the most impoverished affected sectors in the country.

"The free trade agreement with the United States should be configured in the context of an adequate moral perspective. We judge, therefore, that it is imperative to give a human face to economic globalization, globalizing solidarity between people and among peoples", said the letter.