Lima Peru.- An Argentine priest who called on TikTok for the resignation of the Peruvian President, Dina Boluarte, and criticized the deaths of protesters demanding the resignation of the President and Congress, left Peru after his Bishop ordered him to resign from his parish.
Luis Humberto Béjar confirmed, from the Argentine province of La Pampa, where he arrived on a flight on Monday, that he will spend a sabbatical year without intervention in pastoral matters. This is the first case of a foreign priest leaving Peru after speaking out in tune with the protesters calling for Boluarte’s resignation.
“I was encouraged to say that peace will be achieved with the resignation of the current President. I do not regret having said that and I would say it 50 more times. If I am not mistaken, 17 people were assassinated in three hours, with another dying in the course of the following days, because she was injured,” said Béjar, who was the parish priest of the Santa Isabel de Pucará church, in the southeastern region of Puno.
“Some say the protesters died. They have not died of disease, or as expected deaths, they have been people whose lives have been taken from them.”
Béjar lived 26 years in Puno and is a theologian from the Pontificia Universidad Católica Argentina and a doctor of Education from the Universidad Católica Santa María de Arequipa. The priest is also a professor at the National University of the Altiplano in Puno.
“Above all, they say that we priests should not talk about politics,” he added, recalling that Pope John Paul II spoke of “wild capitalism” and that the current Pope Francis speaks of the nature of ecology against the depredation of the Amazon. .
“The Church has always been immersed in the issues of society, because the Church is part of the city and the city means politics, since Aristotle in the fourth century.”
The Bishop of Puno, Jorge Carrión, direct boss of Béjar, asked him in a letter on January 9 to present his resignation from the parish of Pucará and take a sabbatical year.
“Your imprudence is causing serious damage to the Church and a feeling against you is growing, especially because you are a foreigner, who they identify as a terrorist,” Carrión wrote in the letter.
The Chancellor of the Diocese of Puno, Alex Cano, confirmed to the local press that Béjar requested to make use of his sabbatical year.
Thousands of peasants in Juliaca thanked the priest for being present next to the coffins of the murdered protesters in a massive gathering in the streets of that Peruvian city.
“The pain of the people was impressive, my legs trembled,” said Béjar, who believes that the Church should be with the mourners in the hardest moments.
Demonstrations against Boluarte and Congress have so far left 50 dead, 49 civilians and one police officer, according to counts from the Ombudsman’s Office. There have been another eight victims due to traffic accidents or events related to the road blockade and 720 injuries.
In 2020, the priest Béjar also called for the resignation of the then Peruvian President, Manuel Merino, who ruled for a week, after Congress dismissed his predecessor Martín Vizcarra (2018-2020) for an alleged case of corruption. Béjar criticized Merino for the deaths of two young people in the protests that lasted a week and left 200 injured. He was not dismissed or received reprimands from his superiors, the priest recalled.
