Puerto Rican Archbishop Condemns Toppling of Colonist's Statue Ahead of Spanish King's Visit

Catholic News Agency ^ | 1/26/22 | Diego Lopez Marina

[marshmallow]

The Archbishop of San Juan de Puerto Rico, Roberto Octavio González Nieves, expressed his sorrow and repudiated the demolition of the city’s statue of Juan Ponce de León, a Spanish colonizer who was Puerto Rico’s first governor.

“I would like to express my sadness over the acts that led to the demolition of the statue of the first governor of Puerto Rico, Juan Ponce de León. Said action must draw our strongest feeling of repudiation,” the archbishop said in a Jan. 24 statement.

The statue was torn down the night of Jan. 23-24, shortly before the visit of Felipe VI, the king of Spain, to the U.S. territory. The statue was reinstalled later on Jan. 24.

Felipe’s visit marks the 500th anniversary of the founding of San Juan, and is meant to strengthen commercial exchange.

Archbishop González said that "any feeling of recrimination that one has with the facts of our historical past, is not resolved with acts of vandalism or damaging historical places or places valuable for tourism."

The prelate said that "to protest past events you have to act uprightly, openly and without violence."

“Past injustices are rectified through orderly processes of reparation. The mistakes and wounds of the past are corrected through decisions and actions achieved as a result of a dialogue, coordinated by the Government, between the social, economic, educational, cultural and political institutions of the country,” he commented.

The prelate also stressed that "past errors cannot be remembered in order to act with a present marked by violence, but rather we all must learn from these errors by taking steps forward with a reconciling, healing spirit and with respectful, open and fruitful dialogue.”

[Paladin2]

Give PR back to Spain.

[CondoleezzaProtege]

Princess Leonor (on the right) is the future Queen of Spain. To her left is Princess Infanta Sofia.

[Paladin2]

OK;

I surrender to the Hispanics....

[CondoleezzaProtege]

Leonor is SO poised and well-spoken. And her already-good English is about to get better as she heads to Wales for school.

You can tell she understands her role, and she means BUSINESS. Her parents beam with pride whenever she delivers a speech.

[KC_Lion]

Obvious purposeful vandalism ahead of the royal's visit.

Totally expected from the let anymore because we didn't stop them back in 2020.

Thanks for the photos of the princesses too!