Group launches letter campaign to remove San Juan archbishop for supporting Bad Bunny
By The Star Staff
Although San Juan Archbishop Roberto González Nieves apologized recently for praising reggaeton singer Bad Bunny, which angered some in the Catholic Church, a group of church members has launched a letter campaign asking Pope Francis to remove him.
González Nieves last week described the life of the controversial Puerto Rican reggaeton singer as “impeccable,” even though his lyrics are loaded with explicit sexual content.
To kick off the tour for his latest album, “Un Verano Sin Ti,” Bad Bunny booked the Puerto Rico Coliseum José Miguel Agrelot for three nights straight. The tickets were not sold online, so his fans camped outside the facility for hours to buy them. One of the sold-out concerts was live streamed on television and was seen on screens mounted in several plazas. Bad Bunny used the concerts to criticize the island government.
Numerous people took to social media to criticize his music as vulgar and too sexually explicit. González Nieves defended the entertainer, but later had to remove his remarks from social media and apologize to parishioners who were offended by his show of support.
Nonetheless, his apology did not stop a movement, consisting of a letter-writing campaign, to remove the archbishop, arguing that González Nieves’ show of support for Bad Bunny has made him unfit to continue in his position.
“The archbishop’s support for this artist has caused great scandal among Catholic and non-Catholic people since the music of this artist denigrates women, promotes the use of drugs and free sex, and is clearly contrary to the doctrine of the Catholic Church,” the letter states. “Let us remember that this artist said of himself in an interview ‘I am the new God,’ [and] presents himself as the founder of a ‘new religion’ that intends to ‘buy the soul’ of his listeners. Even in one of his recent concerts, the facade of the church in the municipality of Vega Baja was covered, as a metaphor for the impersonation of God. In addition, this artist has become a promoter of gender ideology, pointed out by Popes Benedict XVI and Francis as highly harmful to the human family.”
The group also noted that the archbishop committed a “grave injustice” by shutting down the teachers’ retirement system for several Catholic schools run by the archdiocese, leaving teachers without a pension “and his mismanagement led to the bankruptcy of the archdiocese of San Juan.”