Catholic church grapples with donations from Drug Cartels

This article is very significant for a number of Reasons.


-It shows how difficult it can be to split the relationship between narco-insurgents and the local populace in order to establish effective local governance- you need a supportive population to have governance...and right now governance is shaped more by the cartels.


-It highlights how deeply the drug culture is buried within Mexican society and its institutions. This is the kind of culture more effective and better functioning nation states do not need e.g. the United States.


-The article highlights a moral dilemma religous institutions face...whether money comes from the mob or from the cartels...religious institutions are in no position to claim themselves to be followers of a faith if they affect moral relativism to survive.


-If the population, and its institutions, do not support the government, how can they expect governance to ever grow effective? This is an interesting dilemma...one compounded in todays world economic crisis.

Borderland Beat: Catholic church grapples with donations from Mexic...: "By Damien Cave New York Times The large orange chapel here, with its towering cross, would be just another Roman Catholic church if not ..."

-On a postive note, the article also notes some priests are fighting off the influences of the cartels.

Very interesting article. How do you seperate the cartels from the population, if they are a part of the local community? Meaning? The cartels contribute money to the local church.


Catholic churches in Mexico are finding themselves in the middle of a moral dilemma; some of them are fighting back.