“The silence of the Vatican and the hierarchy on Nicaragua is far from the evangelical mission”
Press release from Nicaraguan Religious Women and Men in hiding
“We commit ourselves not just to accompanying these communities in their resistance to the dictatorship, but also to sharing the experience of these communities with other communities and people in general.”
“This silence propagated by the Holy See and practiced by the Nicaraguan hierarchy in the face of the brutal dictatorship of the Ortega-Murillo couple is a silence which leaves the Nicaraguan people sad and hopeless.”
“Why does the Holy See exhort exiled priests and bishops like Silvio Báez and Rolando Álvarez to lower their voices?”
“Just like the silence in the face of the genocide of the Palestinian people is unacceptable, in the same way silence in the face of the suffering of the Nicaraguan people seems to us indefensible.”
“Disobedience to evil is just as much an obligation as obedience to the good,” Mahatma Gandhi.
From the underground in Nicaragua subjected to repression, we consecrated men and women send to the public the following reflection. By making the decision to live and “cast our lot” with communities repressed by the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship, we commit ourselves not just to accompanying these communities in their resistance to the dictatorship, but also to share the experience of these communities with other communities and people in general. In this press release we will try to share something about what these communities in resistance in different parts of Nicaragua are currently feeling and which the lack of freedom of expression, democracy and rule of law keeps from being known.
This silence propagated by the Holy See and practiced by the Nicaraguan hierarchy in the face of the brutal dictatorship of the Ortega-Murillo couple is a silence which leaves the Nicaraguan people sad and hopeless. The only thing that they have in these times of religious persecution is faith and hope, in the face of the harassment and persecution which the parish communities experience, who are subjected to permanent surveillance, silent harassment and the nearly weekly visits of Police agents of Nicaragua, uniformed as well as intelligence officers carrying out the work of intimidation.
While the dictatorial violence and oppression grows daily against the abandoned people, such silence of the Vatican as well as the hierarchy departs from the evangelical mission. As the lawyer and human rights defender Martha Patricia Molina has said from exile, “Why put up with even dismantling an entire diocese like that of Matagalpa? Injustice after injustice and that silence which begins to echo from Cardinal Leopoldo Brenes.”
As is well known, within the clergy in Nicaragua, there is a disposition to be docile in the face of the regime, but with the communities we ask ourselves: Why does the Holy See exhort exiled priests and bishops like Silvio Báez and Rolando Álvarez to lower their voices? Jesus was never silent in the face of multiple threats…and much less when the authorities attacked his followers and the most vulnerable…women, children, the sick…Even the Vatican itself at times has exhorted the Latin American youth to “go into the streets” to claim their rights.
But at the moment of truth in Nicaragua…a silence which exposes the people daily to a more and more brutal violence. And the human rights violations in Nicaragua are clouded by the power of the big communications media and the geopolitical agenda.
Living in the midst of victimized communities, we are witnesses to the disappointment felt by so many Nicaraguans in the face of the silence and apparent indifference, even of the traditional political class who take postures far from the community, local and national reality. If the reason for this silence of the hierarchy is the erroneous calculus that the silence will in the long term save the “institutional church”, besides contradicting the Gospel itself, such a calculus ignores the experience of centuries: totalitarian dictators interpret the silence as a “green light” to continue and worsen the oppression.
Jesus spent his entire public life accompanying, alleviating suffering…and raising his voice in defense of the most vulnerable. In Latin America today it would be difficult to find a people more vulnerable than the Nicaraguan people.
Just like the silence in the face of the genocide of the Palestinian people is unacceptable, in the same way, silence in the face of the suffering of the Nicaraguan people seems to us indefensible