Mexico City — A Mexican bishop announced his intentions to run as a candidate in the country's upcoming elections, then backtracked — a decision creating confusion and reviving debate in Mexico over the role of priests and pastors in the country's politics.
Bishop Onésimo Cepeda Silva, 84, revealed plans April 5 to run as a candidate for the legislature of Mexico state — the state surrounding Mexico City — with a new political party known as Fuerza por México. But the bishop backtracked the same day after both the Mexican bishops' conference and Diocese of Ecatepec — which Cepeda previously led — disavowed his candidacy.
"The (conference) disavows all political acts that Bishop Cepeda is carrying out in a personal capacity. (He) is not exercising them, not in his words or action, as an official representative of the Catholic Church," the bishops' conference said in an April 5 statement.