In Mexico, pope’s visit underscores perilous life of priests
(The Christian Science Monitor) Pope Francis’s message against organized crime was potent in a country where more than 100,000 people have been killed in drug wars since 2006 and where some 80 percent of the population identifies as Catholic.
But his mid-February visit also highlighted a lesser known challenge for Mexico: its status as the most dangerous place in Latin America to be a Catholic priest.
Over the past three and a half years, 11 priests have been brutally murdered, and another two have gone missing. They join a list of 53 fallen church leaders since 1992, when the Mexico City–based Catholic Multimedia Center first started keeping count. The majority of the slain priests died over the past decade, when drug wars came into full swing.
