VENEZUELA remains in a state of “tense calm” after the capture of President Nicolás Maduro by Unite States troops, the Provisional Bishop of Venezuela diocese, the Rt Revd Cristóbal Olmedo León Lozano, has reported.
Bishop Lozano told the Episcopal News Service that he had been in touch with some of the diocese’s nine clergy and members of its 15 missions. “The clergy and laypeople I’ve spoken with said there is a tense calm in the country — a lot of uncertainty and increased fear due to the statements made by President Donald Trump and Venezuelan leaders,” he said.
President Maduro has been charged in a US federal court with narco-terrorism and drug-trafficking charges, after a swift overnight US military operation on 3 January, when he and his wife were captured and taken to the US (News, 9 January). They remain in detention in New York. President Maduro pleaded not guilty on all charges.
His deputy, Delcy Rodriguez, has been installed as interim President and has offered to collaborate with President Trump. The government this week began releasing Americans detained across the country.
Christian congregations in Venezuela are predominantly Roman Catholic. The President of the Venezuelan Bishops’ Conference, Archbishop Jesús González de Zárate of Valencia, said that the Church had a vital part to play in offering support, and working for peace and reconciliation.
He told the National Catholic Reporter that churches were open, but “calm and prudence [were] essential”, and said: “The Catholic Church continues to be a primary moral reference point for the majority of the Venezuelan people.”
The Pope this week met with Venezuela’s Opposition leader and Nobel Peace prizewinner Maria Corina Machado in a surprise private audience in the Vatican. She posted on X afterwards: “Today I had the blessing and the honor of being able to share time with His Holiness and express our gratitude for his attention to what is happening in our country.
“I also conveyed to him the strength of the Venezuelan people who remain steadfast and in prayer for the freedom of Venezuela, and I asked him to intercede for all Venezuelans who remain kidnapped and missing.”
She is due to visit President Trump at the White House on Thursday.
Millions of Venezuelans fled the country under Mr Maduro’s presidency. As of June 2025, about 1.1 million of nearly eight million Venezuelan migrants have arrived in the United States.