1st Week of February

Wow! It’s the 1st Week of February already. New Year’s feels like only last week. We are into our 3rd week of the 2nd semester, and things are going well. In class we’ve been listening to Barack Obama’s Inaugural speech–it’s been interesting to discuss in class.

Also, it’s a snowy, blustery day, and I love it. It’s not too cold either. It’s nice to have some winter weather when the temperatures are low. Otherwise, I think blue skies every day would be rather boring.

I’ve been reading a book of quotations by the late Oscar Romero. He was an El Salvadoran bishop who fought (I don’t mean with weapons) for the rights of his oppressed people against a terribly oppressive government who was supported by the US. The government committed terrible atrocities against its people; tortured, murdered, and silenced any way they could the voice of dissent–the voice that cried out from the “least of these” across that country. They did so in order to protect what they had; power, strength, position, control.

Oscar Romero, at first being a defender of the status quo and not wanting to get his hands dirty, quietly went about his work. But after a good friend was murdered by the government and he experienced the deep suffering of his people he could no longer sit quietly. In fact, his voice became loud and prophetic. Just as Krst proclaimed, “The Spirit of the Lrd is on me, because he has anointed me to prch good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lrd’s favor (Luke 4:18-19),” so too did Romero speak on behalf of the “least of these”. And, like many prophetic voices throughout history, his was tragically silenced by an assassin’s bullet.

Here’s a quote from his Sunday message on Sept 24, 1978:

“Thus is our Gd–blessed may he be–who has given us to know how he calls at every moment and at every moment is ready to receive us, no matter the crimes we have committed. And so, brothers and sisters, I repeat again what I have said here so often, addressing by radio those who perhaps have caused so many injustices and acts of violence, those who have brought tears to so many homes, those who have stained themselves with the blood of so many murders, those who have hands soiled with tortures, those who have calloused their consciences, who are unmoved to see under their boots a person abased, suffering, perhaps ready to die. To all of them I say: No matter your crimes. They are ugly and horrible, and you have abased the highest dignity of a human person, but Gd calls you and forgives you. And here perhaps arises the aversion of those who feel they are laborers from the first hour. How can I be in heaven with those criminals? Brothers and sisters, in heaven there are no criminals. The greatest criminal, once he has repented of his sins, is now a child of Gd.”

How liberating!–both for the oppressed and the oppressor. Our Father saves not just the oppressed from the oppressor, but he actually saves the oppressor, freeing him/her from the oppression of being an oppressor. How awesome! Thus is the nature of our Gd. Blessed be his name!