Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero
Archbishop Romero, 1917-1980
He was shot holding up the Eucharist and his blood spilled on the altar where Christ sheds His blood at every Mass. The grave sin of killing one of God’s holy anointed ones was never punished by the same government he had spoken out against in his homilies.
Twenty-nine years ago today, March 24, Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, was shot in San Salvador during a Mass where he spoke about how a grain of wheat remains just that unless it falls to the ground and bears fruit. He had told El Salvador’s military hit squads that they were not bound to follow orders that conflicted with the word of God. When he said it, he knew he wouldn’t live long. In his final homily just moments before he was shot in the heart, the Archbishop offered his blood to Christ and blessed those whom he knew would murder him. (Here, you can see his last Mass and some of the funeral procession.)
I was a college student when I heard about Archbishop Romero’s death and the sacrilege of shedding blood in a holy place shocked me then, as it still does now. The dirty wars in Central and South America that were paid for by US government dollars and the covert Contragate produced the assassins trained at the Army’s School of the Americas in Fort Benning, GA. Archbishop Romero wrote a letter to President Jimmy Carter in an effort to halt US funding for terrorism in El Salvador:
“You say that you are Christian. If you are really Christian, please stop sending military aid to the military here, because they use it only to kill my people.”
Nuns and lay workers were raped and killed on roadsides, priests were shot and countless numbers of poor peasants who wanted to live in peace were slaughtered in campaigns that had American military help. The thousands who take part in protests at Fort Benning each year to call for the closing of the School of the Americas, which has changed its name but not its tactics, are heroic Christians who risk time in prison to speak out about evil condoned by a government that always used to have the moral high ground in human rights. (Watch the documentary Taxi to the Dark Side to feel shame in how America’s treatment of post 9/11 detainees is nothing more than medieval torture condoned by a cavalier, know-nothing President for whom everything became a game, not matter how reprehensible an act it involved.)
The pastor at our church spoke about Archbishop Romero’s assassination during Sunday’s homily. He had read the Gospel passage about the blind man healed by Jesus. Our pastor reminded us that the people of El Salvador didn’t expect much of Archbishop Romero after his appointment. After all, he was quiet, bookish and very conservative. They imagined he would side with those in power instead of standing with the poor.
“Archbishop Romero’s eyes were opened by his people,” said our pastor. Like the blind man healed by Jesus, the Archbishop suddenly saw the light and followed it. A fellow priest who was a friend of his had been assassinated on the road with the old man and little boy who were accompanying him. Archbishop Romero saw the three bodies and then observed how the murders weren’t investigated. The blindfold fell from his eyes. The day before his death, Archbishop Romero made a plea to the military men who were killing their own people:
“In the name of God then, in the name of this suffering people I ask you, I beg you, I command you in the name of God: stop the repression.”
Actor Raul Julia played Archbishop Romero in a beautiful feature film that brought the martyr’s story to many more who might not have known about his sacrifice. One of my favorite singer/songwriters, Ruben Blades, wrote the heartfelt El Padre Antonio y el Monaguillo Andres (Father Antonio and the Altar Boy Andres), which is a fictionalized account of Archbishop Romero’s death at Mass for speaking out against the military. In the song, the murder of the priest is seen alongside the death of the active little altar boy who dies ”without ever meeting Pele.” As Blades says in some versions of the song, “In Latin America, they kill people, but not the idea.”
Since Archbishop Romero’s death, he has been celebrated as a courageous shepherd and a martyr who will one day be canonized. Perhaps he will become the patron saint of the churches in Central America or of those religious who speak out against government wrongdoing. Let us call on this holy man who chose to be wheat that fell on the ground for others to inspire us to follow his example.
