The president travels to the Vatican on Saturday to project an image of rapprochement with the head of the Catholic Church.
The week was pronounced like the slope of Calvary The peak came Wednesday and Thursday in Congress with the most conservative wing of the benches with knife in hand and a PP with its vote still to be defined
But at the end of the slope the President of the Government Pedro Sánchez knew that he was waiting for a reward
The photo with Pope Francis the first time that the Pontiff received a Spanish president since April 2013 when Mariano Rajoy visited him with his newly arrived wife Jorge Mario Bergoglio in the chair of Pedro was an extraordinary wild card
And he used it Before and also during the debate He cited his latest encyclical referred to him as an inspiring figure assured that faith is essential and came to question the Christian values of the Vox leader and author of the motion of censure Santiago Abascal
The instrumentalization has been total This is exactly what the Vatican does not usually enthuse which prefers to safeguard the figure of the Pope in the internal divisions of each country
The Government is euphoric with the visit on Saturday scheduled for 930 It comes at a perfect time to send the message that the president is not a radical leftist as the opposition draws him but an open man capable of getting on well with the head of the Catholic Church
The Vatican which has agreed to receive him at a strategic moment well aware of the political impact it could have had not officially announced this Thursday Pedro Sánchezs visit
But from Moncloa it was leaked last week and was later communicated in writing well in advance The president also advanced during his trip to Rome on Tuesday where he held a bilateral meeting with his counterpart Giuseppe Conte at the ItalySpain forum which would invite the Pope to visit Spain when it is possible
A movement that seeks to further strengthen ties with the Vatican at a time of extreme polarization around the figure of the Pontiff
The openminded vision of Pope Francis on some issues especially of a social nature such as his last comment in favor of civil unions between homosexuals has generated an unusual division in the Church and in its surroundings of power
His forays into politics his criticisms of nationalism populism or the construction of walls were taken from the beginning as a kind of opposition to the farright movements and specifically to the President of the United States Donald Trump
In the heat of the faithful of the North American president part of the American Church was also organized with prominent cardinals such as Raymond Burke waging a battle in broad daylight against the Pope
The division has spread to other countries It also happened in Italy when Matteo Salvini was Minister of the Interior and daily lashed out at the NGOs that rescued migrants in the Mediterranean
But Spain had not yet arrived until Vox picked up the baton
Santiago Abascal called the Pope a citizen of Bergoglio last April reducing his status as Pontiff for having demonstrated in favor of a universal salary
When the Vox leader traveled to Rome in September 2019 to participate in the annual meeting organized by the postfascist party Fratelli di Italia visited the Vatican and met with the prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship Guinean Cardinal Robert Sarah one of the strongest ideological opponents of the Pope within the walls
Hence the first words that Sánchez pronounced regarding the Pontiff before his visit His figure is unquestionable he said with an unnecessary statement in a normal situation and positioning himself frontally against his critics
A move that also allows him to get closer to the moderate Catholic world
The hand of the Pope after almost eight years of pontificate is already strongly noticeable in Spain where the most conservative sector has been losing power
After the appointment of the cardinal and archbishop of Barcelona Juan José Omella as president of the Episcopal Conference on Wednesday and Thursday he was in the Vatican the movements in the dioceses have also begun
The harmony with the Government which has thorny issues on the table that must be agreed with the Church such as the publication of the list of unregistered assets prepared for a year and a half in the Ministry of Justice and the decision to pay the IBI for its properties it seems good
Government sources indicate that negotiation in these fields is going very well The Executive does not renounce any of these bets but wants to do it in tune with the Church
The meeting however should not go down there The same sources insist that these issues are matters of the bilateral relationship of the Church and the Government and will not be discussed in the conversation between Sánchez and Francisco
The quote they believe will have a deeper character and will touch on issues such as the content of Fratelli Tutti the Popes last encyclical which Pedro Sánchez has already mentioned in some forums before doing so in Congress last Wednesday
Furthermore issues such as immigration poverty or the cohesion of Europe will have their place
The position of the Pope on social and economic issues also in ecology has always been in tune with that of Sánchez and in La Moncloa they believe that there will be many more agreements than disagreements which undoubtedly exist between the Vatican and a government like the Spaniard who has already promoted a law on euthanasia which is being processed and is studying another on abortion
