The Macrorregional South Meeting «Entrelazando Voces por la Dignidad», presented by Vatican News as part of the preparations for the visit of Leo XIV to Peru, opened without any Catholic prayer: instead, a rite of invocation to Mother Earth with distribution of coca leaves, breathing exercises, and food offerings on the ground.
Among the offerors, as the images show, Msgr. Jordi Bertomeu, official of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith and pontifical commissioner for the Sodalicio, who places his coca leaves in the bowl of the «pago» with visible reverence and who, after finishing his intervention on the Sodalicio case, turns his nameplate face down and exits the camera frame.
On August 13 and 14, the Macrorregional South Meeting «Entrelazando Voces por la Dignidad: for human rights and the common good» was held in Cusco, bringing together representatives of social organizations, indigenous communities, and collectives from nine regions of southern Peru. The meeting was inaugurated by Msgr. Lizardo Estrada Herrera, auxiliary bishop of Cusco and secretary general of CELAM, and was attended by Msgr. Miguel Ángel Cadenas, bishop of Iquitos. What the official Vatican News report does not mention is how it began — nor who else was there.
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