Thirty years ago today, Archbishop Oscar Romero, champion of the poor, was assassinated while serving Mass in San Salvador.
The perpetrators of the crime were right-wing "death squads" associated with Major Roberto D'Aubuisson. These death squads were also responsible for the deaths of four nuns, dozens of labor leaders, and perhaps as many as 30,000 people in El Salvador.
At the time of his election as archbishop, he was known as a "orthodox, pious bookworm" who had been critical of liberation theology.
Yet, his mind was changing. In 1975, he protested an attack by the National Guard at Tres Calles in which dozens of people were killed.
Then, shortly after he took office, one of his priests, Rutilio Grande, was assassinated along with two of Grande's parishioners, for advocating for poor peoples' rights to organize farm cooperatives. Romero excommunicated the murderers, and, except for one Mass at the cathedral, cancelled all services the following Sunday.
Romero took on the cause of the peasants. He moved out of the episcopal palace and into a hospital that served the poor. Meanwhile, right wing groups were leafleting the country: "Be a patriot; Kill a priest."
Romero did not budge an inch. He continued and intensified his campaign for the poor. As he said: "When the church hears the cry of the oppressed it cannot but denounce the social structures that give rise to and perpetuate the misery from which the cry arises."
Today, Archbishop Romero is regarded as a national hero in El Salvador. Shortly before his death, he said, "I do not believe in death without resurrection. If they kill me, I will be resurrected in the Salvadoran people."
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