http://www.seattletimes.com/extra/browse/html97/altmexi_092397.html

Drug lords' charity is praised by priest

by Molly Moore
Washington Post

MEXICO CITY A Catholic priest took to the pulpit of the national
Basilica of Guadalupe here this weekend to praise Mexico's most
infamous drug kingpins as generous benefactors of a variety of
charitable causes who should be emulated by other Mexicans.

Declaring that some drug traffickers "do much good work," the Rev.
Raul Soto Vazquez told hundreds of churchgoers that two of the
country's bestknown drug lords had made substantial donations to
programs to help the needy for more than a decade. "Not everything
these people do is bad," he added.

Soto said the purpose of his sermon had been to show that "sinners
also do good things."

The priest noted that drug trafficker Rafael Caro Quintero donated
$100,000 to the victims of Mexico City's disastrous 1985 earthquake.
Caro Quintero is now in prison on charges related to the killing of
U.S. federal drug agent Enrique Camerena that same year. Soto said
also that Amado Carrillo Fuentes, Mexico's most powerful drug lord
until his death in July after extensive plastic surgery and
liposuction, "gave deeply to do great works."

The priest's comments, delivered during a Mass Friday and repeated
at a news conference Sunday, stunned and embarrassed senior Mexican
church officials.

"I have never received anything from narcotraffickers or had any
relations with them," Archbishop Norberto Rivera Carrera told
reporters Sunday.

In Rome, a Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Ciro Benedettini, said the
Holy See had no official comment, but he added: "That is not to say
we agree with what is being said" about donations to the church by
drug traffickers.

Soto's comments were delivered as new details of drugrelated
corruption unfold daily at nearly every level of Mexican society.

U.S. officials estimate that Mexican cartels now supply 70 percent
of the cocaine consumed in the United States.