editorial

Of the 234 legislators and suplentes in Panama’s Legislative Assembly, a rather small minority are Protestants, mostly Evangelicals. The other day the nation’s business was briefly delayed when 15 Evangelical elected officials held a prayer service at the beginning of a legislative session. One of their number has proposed a law to establish a “Bible Month” in Panama. This little Evangelical caucus is also proposing to change the assembly’s procedure to begin each session with a prayer.

Panama has a more than 80 percent Catholic majority. However, we’re also a country with religious freedom. We have had Jewish presidents. There are thriving Muslim and Hindu communities here. One of the most important Bahai temples is in Panama. Buddhism, Confucianism and Shinto are part of the confessional mix in our capital. Anglicans, Baptists, Pentecostalists, Adventists, Mormons, Methodists, Orthodox, Rastafarians, Jehovah’s Witnesses and those who worship Washington Times owner Sun Myung Moon register among our religious minorities. In our indigenous comarcas some people cling to ancient religious traditions and others follow the teachings of latter-day prophets like Mama Atencio. We generally get along.

We get along because after many bitter lessons, we have established certain rules of conduct, written and unwritten.

These bad experiences include the Holy Inquisition, which forced those Spanish Jews and Muslims who did not go into exile to live an underground existence in Panama and the rest of Spain’s empire. In the Americas the Inquisition was particularly brutal to black slaves who clung to West African faiths that still persist in the Santeria and Voodoo rites practiced on the isthmus.

The nightmares of our past include the religious wars of the Reformation, which manifested themselves in attacks upon the Catholic churches of this country during the raids of such British Protestant corsairs as Francis Drake and Henry Morgan, acts of war that featured massacres and tortures committed in the name of religion.

When Panama separated from Spain the Catholic Church opposed the move, while freemasons like Simón Bolívar --- advocates of religious tolerance who were (and are) anathema to the church hierarchy --- were in the vanguard of the forces that overthrew the colonial system.

One of the reasons that Panama declared its independence from Colombia was chronic warfare between Colombia’s Conservatives, who believed that Catholicism ought to be the country’s official religion, and Liberals, who opposed an established state church.

And thus Panama came to the conclusion that, while many of its politicians --- often the best ones --- may be guided by principles rooted in religion, and while the government may pay attention to what religious leaders say, and while the teaching of religion in the public schools may be permitted to an extent short of forcing kids into dogmatic molds to which they or their parents object, our government does not invoke the symbols of religion. The halls of government and the gatherings of political parties are not considered proper venues for religious proselytism, and the churches, synagogues, temples and mosques are not considered fit places for political propaganda.

There can never be an absolute separation of religion and politics. However, lines need to be drawn and have been drawn, and the Evangelical legislators’ attempt to erase or move these lines is a bad idea.

It’s an especially bad idea as a horrified world bears witness to a new round of religious warfare, with atrocities committed by both sides. Osama bin Laden has demanded that Panama and all other countries convert to Islam and embarked on a jihad, a purportedly Mulsim holy war in which most attacks are upon non-combatant civilians like those who worked at the World Trade Center. George W. Bush has called for a crusade, told the people of Panama and all other countries that if we are not for him we are against him, and shown us the meaning of his purportedly Christian holy war at Abu Ghraib prison, where Muslim prisoners were tortured into posing for homosexual pornography.

Our Evangelical legislators are surely not advocating such perversions. But their attack on Panamanian society’s customary restraints could open the door to all of that. Let’s leave that door closed.

There are few nudities so objectionable as the naked truth.

Agnes Repplier

One should as a rule respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny, and is likely to interfere with happiness in all kinds of ways.

Bertrand Russell

All fashionable vices pass for virtues.

Molière

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