Exiled Nicaraguans: Dissolving university that trained seminarians was ‘hostile action’

Washington D.C., Jul 8, 2021 / 18:00 pm The non-profit organization Young Catholic Professionals (YCP) is expanding, with five more chapters around the country slated to launch by the end of 2021. “We have never […]

Pope Francis waves to the crowd in St. Peter’s Square on March 5, 2023, during his Sunday Angelus reflection. / Vatican Media

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Mar 5, 2023 / 08:20 am (CNA).

During his Sunday morning Angelus address, Pope Francis urged the faithful to reflect on the miracle of the Transfiguration and to see the same beauty in the faces of the people we interact with every day. 

In the March 5 address, the pope discussed the “beauty” shown in Sunday’s Gospel reading of Matthew 17:1-9. In this passage, Peter and James and his brother John witness Christ “transfigured before them” with his face shining “like the sun” and his clothes “dazzling white” as he conversed with Moses and Elijah on the top of a mountain. 

Pope Francis said that we must “see the same beauty on the faces of the people who walk beside us every day,” such as family, friends, and colleagues. 

“How many luminous faces, how many smiles, how many wrinkles, how many tears and scars reveal love around us,” the pope said.

“Let us learn to recognize them and to fill our hearts with them. And then let us set out in order to bring the light we have received to others as well, through concrete acts of love diving into our daily occupations more generously, loving, serving, and forgiving with greater earnestness and willingness,” the Holy Father said. “The contemplation of God’s wonders, the contemplation of God’s face, of the Lord’s face, must move us to the service of others.”

Reflecting on beauty the apostles respond to in the Gospel account, the pope asked, “Of what does this beauty consist? What do the disciples see? A special effect? No, that is not it.

“They see the light of God’s holiness shining on the face and on the clothing of Jesus, the perfect image of the Father,” the pope continued.

“God’s majesty, God’s beauty is revealed. But God is Love. Therefore, the disciples had been beholding with their eyes the beauty and splendor of divine Love incarnate in Christ. They had a foretaste of paradise. What a surprise for the disciples!” he said. “They had the face of Love before their very eyes for so long without ever being aware of how beautiful it was! Only now do they realize it with such joy, with immense joy.”

Pope Francis warned against reducing the miracle to simply a “magical moment,” which he said would be “false, artificial, something that would dissolve into the fog of passing sentiment.” He said, rather, this demonstrates something deeper.

“Christ is the light that orients our journey like the pillar of fire for the people in the wilderness,” the pontiff explained. “Jesus’ beauty does not alienate his disciples from the reality of life, but gives them the strength to follow him all the way to Jerusalem, all the way to the cross. Christ’s beauty is not alienating. It always brings you forward. It does not make you hide. Go forward!”

The Gospel reading also “traces a path for us,” according to Pope Francis. He explained how the passage “teaches us how important it is to remain with Jesus even when it is not easy to understand everything he says and does for us.” By staying with Christ, he said “we learn to recognize on his face the luminous beauty of love he gives us, even when it bears the marks of the cross.”

Near the end of his address, Pope Francis told people to ask themselves whether they “recognize the light of God’s love in our lives” and whether they “recognize it with joy and gratitude on the faces of the people who love us.” 

“Do we look around us for the signs of this light that fills our hearts and open them to love and service?” the pope told people to ask themselves. “Or do we prefer the straw fires of idols that alienate us and close us in on ourselves? The great light of the Lord and the false, artificial light of idols. Which do I prefer?”

Following his address, Pope Francis said he is continuing to pray for the victims of a Feb. 28 train accident in Greece, many of whom are young students. He said he is also praying for the victims of a Feb. 26 shipwreck near Crotone, Italy. The pope also welcomed pilgrims and asked people to continue praying for him.

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Managua, Nicaragua, Jun 11, 2018 / 05:01 pm (ACI Prensa).- As unrest centered on protests of president Daniel Ortega continues unabated in Nicaragua, bishops in the country are calling for unity and peace.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights says that at least 127 people have been killed in the protests. Demonstrators have called for freedom of expression, an end to violent repression, and for Ortega to step down from office.

Bishop Silvio José Báez Ortega, Auxiliary Bishop of Managua, called June 11 for a free Nicaragua “without tyrants, or victims, like a great house in which all of us live joyfully, without tears or blood, in liberty and social justice.”

Protests began April 18 after Ortega announced social security and pension reforms. The changes were soon abandoned in the face of widespread, vocal opposition, but protests only intensified after more than 40 protestors were killed by security forces initially.

The Church in Nicaragua was quick to acknowledge the protestors’ complaints, and mediated a short-lived dialogue between the government and protestors.

Barricades and roadblocks are now found throughout the country, and clashes frequently turn lethal.

Bishop Rolando José Álvarez Lagos of Matagalpa exhorted Nicaraguans during his June 10 homily to join “the immense majority” of the population which is asking for an urgent change in the country since “Nicaragua can no longer tolerate this.”

“The people of God must beware the lies that try to divide,” Bishop Álvarez said. “This is the hour for unity in Nicaragua.”

Fr. Vicente Martínez Bermúdez, a priest of the Diocese of Matagalpa, has reported that over the weekend he was detained by a group of 20 hooded men and threatened with death. Another prirest of the Matagalpa diocese was wounded by shrapnel May 15 while trying to separate protestors and security forces, the AP reported.

In Jinotega, Bishop Carlos Enrique Herrera Gutierrez brought the body of a 17-year-old protestor home to his mother June 9.

Bishop Herrera said that he was asked by the national police to intercede during protests the prior evening so that people who were manning barricades would not continue to advance, “and remain peaceful.”

The bishop spoke to the protestors, and “when I left I had reached an agreement that the demonstrators at the barricades would advance no further,” he stated.

But minutes later “they reported to me giving evidence that paramilitary groups controlled by the city government, coming from outside the city, attacked those at the barricades, who remained  peaceful until they were attacked,” Bishop Herrera said.

“In addition the townspeople insisted the riot police opened fire on the civilians who were at the barricades,” he reported.

He spoke to the mayor of Jinotega and the head of the national police, who “denied their involvement in the repressive actions.”

“I was left with no other choice but to personally go out (accompanied by some priests and faithful) at 11 o’clock at night to care for the injured and to transport the body of young Abraham Antonio Castro Jarquín, who sadly died as a result of these confrontations,” he stated.

Bishop Herrera urged demonstrators to “show tolerance and act with respect,” and asked the municipal authorities “not to use violence” because “you will bring on more mourning and an uncontrollable spiral of violence which we will all regret.”

Bishop Herrara asked the faithful to continue to pray for peace, “keep up your petitions and practice mercy with all the needy, especially in emergency situations. We area all responsible to provide assistance in times of crisis, to give a better response to this crisis.”

“I hope that we will all contribute to build peace and stability in our city, where we may have  guarantees to freely express our opinions,” he said.

Nicaragua’s bishops met with Ortega June 7 to discuss the country’s crisis and possible resumption of the suspended national dialogue. The dialogue among the Ortegas, business owners, students, and farmers began May 16 and collapsed May 23.

They issued a statement afterwards conveying to him “the pain and anguish of the people in face of the violence suffered in recent weeks” and to give him “a proposal that brings together the sentiments of many sectors of Nicaraguan society and expresses the strong desire of the vast majority of the population.”

The prelates stated that when the president “has formally responded, we will convene the full session  of the national dialogue to assess that response and therefore the feasibility of continuing with the same national dialogue.”

The dialogue cannot be resume while Nicaraguans continue to be denied the right to demonstrate freely and are “repressed and assasinated”, the bishops stated.

Cardinal Leopoldo José Brenes Solorzano of Managua called on Catholics to pray the rosary daily for peace in the country.

The Nicaraguan government has suggested that protestors are killing their own supporters so as to destabilize Ortega’s administration.

The pension reforms which triggered the unrest were modest, but protests quickly turned to Ortega’s authoritarian bent.

Ortega has been president of Nicaragua since 2007, and oversaw the abolition of presidential term limits in 2014.

He was a leader in the Sandinista National Liberation Front, which had ousted the Somoza dictatorship in 1979 and fought US-backed right-wing counterrevolutionaries during the 1980s. Ortega was also leader of Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990.

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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