Much has been written about how the visit of Pope Benedict XVI should serve as ‘an opportunity’ for Malta to rediscover its spiritual roots, among endless variations of the same theme.
This may indeed be the case, but looking at the same event from a more practical (and less spiritual) angle, it can also be seen to have provided us with a unique opportunity to take a good, hard look at our national institutions – and above all, to question the relationship between Church and State in a country where the two are all too often indistinguishable.
From the outset, it seems the Pope’s visit has served to further blur an already confused and vaguely demarcated boundary line between these institutions... for instance, the extent to which the President of the Republic, HE Dr George Abela, has personally involved himself in promoting the event: appearing in numerous ads on State TV, and urging the public to attend today’s Pontifical Mass for all the world as if it were an extraordinary edition of L-Istrina.
It seems His Excellency needs reminding that, as a Head of State in a European democracy, he is in duty bound to represent all the citizens of Malta – and not just the (admittedly very large) majority which happens to share his own personal religious convictions.
But it is not just the involvement of the President that has raised eyebrows about this visit. At moments, it seems that various other institutions representing the Maltese State have also forgotten that they are answerable directly to the people of Malta, and not to the Ecclesiastical authority of Pope Benedict himself.
Our eagerness to impress His Holiness has in fact given rise to a few laughable gaffes and the occasional embarrassing revelation over the past few weeks. For instance, while Cabinet Ministers were invited to a group photo session with the Pope accompanied by their spouses (all the Cabinet, without exception, being married), ordinary members of parliament were told to attend the same event alone – a substantial number of our MPs being separated, some cohabiting with their partners.
It is anyone’s guess exactly why the State (in this case, the Office of the Prime Minister) should care whether His Holiness is photographed in the company of married or unmarried couples. After all, the same Pope Benedict recently welcomed French premier Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife Carla Bruni at the Vatican, despite the fact that the former is known to be a divorcee. For this reason alone – and, let’s face it, given the unfolding international furore over child abuse allegations, there are countless others – the same Pope is highly unlikely to be ‘scandalised’ at the discovery that some of our MPs live in relationships outside wedlock... still less object to having his photo taken with them.
But the real issue at stake here is infinitely more serious than the government’s eagerness to live up to the lofty moral standards associated with the Papacy itself, and the occasional humorous moment this has inspired.
Lurking in the background is also the uncomfortable reality of a State which, despite having acceded to the European Union in 2004, in many respects remains attached to the Vatican in Rome as though by an extended umbilical cord.
If the ‘group photo’ example cited above represents the external and sometimes silly manifestations of this reality, the underlying truth is perhaps better represented by Article 2 of the Independence Constitution, which – not unlike its various equivalents throughout the Muslim world – declares Roman Catholicism to be ‘the religion of Malta’, without in any way specifying what relationship should prevail between religion and politics.
Events of the past year alone have illustrated the potential dangers that such a vague Constitutional proviso may still pose in today’s pluralistic society.
For instance, we have seen how some opponents of divorce – incidentally, another symptom of our national inability to distinguish between Church and State matters – have cited this very clause in defence of their arguments... forgetting that modern Malta is also home to a growing secularist population, including many practising Catholics, which is uncomfortable with the apparent interweaving of religious edicts and national law.
In many respects, then, the government’s active involvement in the Papal visit has served to compound this state of affairs, and also concretise the increasingly anachronistic perception that Malta as some sort of ‘satellite’ of the Vatican State – a perception heavily reinforced by our record number of concordats with the Holy See.
Let us therefore hope and pray that the Pope’s visit also serves to highlight the discrepancy of a EU member state evidently unable to distinguish between these two disparate institutions, and rectify the situation accordingly.
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