tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8833518530559679192.post7252377120754717549..comments2023-09-29T08:07:48.323-07:00Comments on oneheartforpeace: Romero's Resurrection: Thirty Years after his AssassinationUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8833518530559679192.post-87417853292935103152010-03-24T16:21:21.668-07:002010-03-24T16:21:21.668-07:00Be sure to leave other highlights about the religi...Be sure to leave other highlights about the religious needing to be about peace and more above...<br /><br />I will end what struck me with this:<br /><br />"Romero lived in a sparse, three-room hermitage on the grounds of a hospital run by a community of nuns. During his busy days, he traveled the country, met with hundreds of poor Salvadorans, presided at Mass, and met with local community leaders. He assisted everyone he could"<br /><br />He said that one of his primary duties had become to challenge the U.S.-backed government and its death squads but also to "claim the dead bodies of their victims, including priests, nuns and catechists."<br /><br />Now that would get some attention if we in the US would do this for the used and discarded poor in these 3-4 US occupations if not more during the months and sadly possibly YEARS until they end!<br /><br />Romero would drive out to garbage dumps to look for the discarded, tortured victims of the death squads on behalf of grieving loved ones.<br /><br />He also took time every day to speak with dozens of people threatened by government death squads...he listened to everyone. <br /><br />"His compassionate ear fueled his prophetic voice." By Father John Dear....<br /><br />Romero said: "You cannot find God on the path of torture. God is found on the way of justice, conversion and truth."<br /><br />Romero wrote a long public letter to Carter, asking the United States to cancel all military aid. Carter ignored Romero's plea<br /><br />During his March 23, 1980, Sunday sermon, Romero let loose and issued one of the greatest appeals for peace and disarmament in church history:<br /><br />"I would like to make an appeal in a special way to the men of the army, to the police, to those in the barracks. Brothers, you are part of our own people. You kill your own campesino brothers and sisters. And before an order to kill that a man may give, the law of God must prevail that says: Thou shalt not kill! No soldier is obliged to obey an order against the law of God. No one has to fulfill an immoral law. It is time to recover your consciences..."<br /><br />In the name of God, and in the name of this suffering people whose laments rise to heaven each day more tumultuously, I beg you, I ask you, I order you in the name of God: Stop...!" <br /><br />On March 24, 1980, Romero read from John's Gospel: "Unless the grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains only a grain. But if it dies, it bears much fruit "(12:23-26). Then he preached about the need to give our lives for others..."<br /><br />John Dear in article above tells how stunned he was to hear this news in his dorm. He tells how his friend Paul Farmer, living next door to me, marks his conversion from that event. (Farmer would become a doctor and teacher at Harvard University and founder of Partners In Health, an international health and social justice organization.) Both of us were touched and changed by Romero's gift.<br /><br />Romero's funeral became the largest demonstration in Salvadoran history, some say in the history of Latin America. The government... threw bombs into the crowd and opened fire, killing some 30 people and injuring hundreds more. The Mass of Resurrection was never completedCNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10877484524704475807noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8833518530559679192.post-50939670819903441192010-03-24T16:09:05.692-07:002010-03-24T16:09:05.692-07:00We often think our very weak and trembling actions...We often think our very weak and trembling actions - our petitions, etc. - as important as they often are - are big deals...or that because we have a particular status...the wife of this the Dr. or scholar of this school or that book...we can't be this courageous...well look what ARchbishop of El Salvador, Romero, dared to do and not do...<br /><br />"To protest the government's silence in the face of recent massacres, he refused to attend the INAUGURATION of the new Salvadoran president. The church, he announced, is "not to be measured by the government's support but rather by its own authenticity, its...spirit of prayer, trust, sincerity and justice, its opposition to abuses." <br /><br />...Romero made two radical decisions that were unprecedented. First, on Easter Monday 1978, he opened the seminary in downtown San Salvador to WELCOME ANY AND ALL DISPLACED VICTIMS OF VIOLENCE. Hundreds of homeless, hungry and brutalized people MOVED INTO THE SEMINARY, transforming the quiet religious retreat into a crowded, noisy shelter, make-shift hospital, and playground...."<br /><br />Just what would a similar action look like in the United States or even in other religious and honored places: Synagogues, Mosques, Schools, Temples, Congregations?<br /><br />Have we ever experienced such an action by our spiritual and academic leaders? Well if not, WHY not?<br /><br />"Next, he halted construction on the new cathedral in San Salvador. When the war is over, the hungry are fed, and the children are educated, then we can resume building our cathedral, he said. Both historic moves...lifted the peoples' spirits..."<br /><br />One more highlight...next commentCNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10877484524704475807noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8833518530559679192.post-48652553749756333872010-03-24T16:01:14.544-07:002010-03-24T16:01:14.544-07:00Hello, I'm continuing to highlight items which...Hello, I'm continuing to highlight items which struck me today in this JOhn Dear article as they have when I first read about Father Romero years ago...<br /><br />I am struck that we stil have US backed Gov contractors who sometimes seem to act very much like these "death squads"...<br /><br />"As the U.S.-backed government death squads attacked villages and churches and massacred campesinos, Romero's truth-telling became a veritable subversive campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience.<br /><br />'Soon Romero was greeted with applause everywhere he went. Thousands wrote to him regularly, telling their stories, thanking him for his prophetic voice and sharing their new found courage. His Sunday homilies were broadcast nationwide on live radio. The country came to a standstill as he spoke. Everyone listened, even the death squads.<br /><br />'As Romero's stature grew and his leadership for justice and peace deepened, his simple faith and pious devotion remained steady, and gave him a foundation from which he could take on the forces of death..." <br /><br />See more highlighted items and why they have struck me so today in at least one more comment below...CNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10877484524704475807noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8833518530559679192.post-35461201959704163822010-03-24T15:57:58.906-07:002010-03-24T15:57:58.906-07:00When Romero had shut down ALL churches except one....When Romero had shut down ALL churches except one...Over a hundred thousand people attended that one cathedral Mass that Sunday and heard Romero's bold call for justice, disarmament and peace..."<br /><br />SUDDENLY there was this towering figure in the midst of the nation..<br /><br />As religious people were "regularly targeted and assassinated, so Romero spoke out even more forcefully. He even criticized the president, which no Salvadoran bishop had ever done before, and few in the hemisphere ever did."...see more next comment..CNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10877484524704475807noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8833518530559679192.post-89265667292580239382010-03-24T15:55:21.156-07:002010-03-24T15:55:21.156-07:00The above article by Father John Dear, also a vita...The above article by Father John Dear, also a vital strong and courageous example for a life of gret pece, reminds me that no matter how early or late in life we decide to transform our actions, we can make a tremendous difference....<br /><br />Three years before Romero was to be assassinated - ONLY THREE! - he stood over his dead friend and mentor's body and "that night, Romero was transformed into one of the world's great champions for the poor and oppressed. From then on, he stood with the poor, and denounced every act of violence, injustice and war. The day after Grande's death, Romero preached a sermon that stunned El Salvador. With the force of Martin Luther King, Jr., Romero...demanded social and economic justice for the poor, and called everyone to take up Grande's prophetic work..." To protest the government's participation in the murders, Romero...cancelled all Masses in the country the following week, except for one special Mass in the cathedral.<br /><br />That act alone would have put Romero in the annals of history. Imagine if every Mass in the United States but one had been canceled in protest after the death of Dr. King! <br /><br />See more highlights below which really struck me in a big way...CNhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10877484524704475807noreply@blogger.com