The Portal October 2018 | Page 9

THE P RTAL October 2018 Page 9 Catholic Social Teaching Oscar Romero Fr Ashley Beck T his series for T he P ortal is about Catholic Social Teaching. In any theological tradition, we are given inspiration from the example and teachings of particular people. This month one such figure in the Christian tradition of teaching about social justice is being canonised in Rome by the Holy Father – Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador. He has become an inspiration not only to Catholics but to other Christians: some years ago a statue of him was erected on the outside wall of Westminster Abbey and I think he appears in the liturgical calendar of the Church of England. Oscar Romero was born just over a hundred years ago. El Salvador was and is still one of the poorest countries in the world; most of the country’s wealth is held by a tiny proportion of the population, and most of the population live in dire poverty. Although in the village where Romero was born his father ran the local post office, the family were still hard up; but he showed talent at school and the local diocese arranged for him to go to seminary to train for the priesthood, first in his home country and then in Rome during the Second World War. On his return to El Salvador as a young and talented priest, he worked in broadcasting as well as pastoral ministry, and then became secretary of the Bishops’ Conference. In 1970 he became an Auxiliary Bishop in the capital city and from 1974 bishop of a small rural diocese; he became Archbishop of San Salvador at the beginning of 1977. By the late 1960s the Church in El Salvador, as in other places, was divided. On the one hand were those who had a very other-worldly and spiritualised theology and who took no account of the sufferings of so many Catholics. Catholics were simply meant to come to Mass and accept their lot in the world, hoping for a better life in heaven. If the soldiers of the government, or death squads organised by right wing political parties kidnapped you, tortured or killed you - then that was simply something you should put up with. On the other hand were those who, inspired by the teachings of the Second Vatican Council, and by the ground-breaking meeting of the Conference of Latin American and Caribbean bishops (CELAM) in 1968 at Medellín in Columbia, which began the whole tradition of Liberation Theology, realised that the Church had to identify with the struggle of the poor and listen to them. movement, in many ways thanks to the teaching of one of our lecturers, Fr Len Pepper. The career of Oscar Romero is a fascinating narrative in terms of these divisions in the Church. For we know that when he first became a bishop in the early 70s he was perceived to be a ‘conservative’ figure; and indeed when he became Archbishop in 1977 the political elite in San Salvador and their allies in the Church welcomed his appointment. Soon after taking office Romero encountered the reality of the hatred towards the Church from the regime in his country and death squads determined to silence those trying to defend the rights of the poor. A well-known Jesuit priest whom he knew well, with others from his parish, was murdered. From now on Romero constantly tried to call the State to account for actions against poor communities and those who supported them. A key event also was the case of a village which was occupied for some weeks by security services, and in this time the soldiers not only kidnapped and killed innocent people, but also fired their machine guns at the tabernacle in the church and desecrated the Blessed Sacrament. When they left, the archbishop came to the village and celebrated a Mass of reparation, in which he linked the deaths of his people to the attacks on Our Lord. As is well known, in March 1980, following growing tensions between Romero and the government, he was shot (just after his homily) while saying Mass in the hospital chapel near where he lived. We now see Oscar Romero not only as a martyr for Christian teaching but as a sign of unity for the Church. During his life, and indeed in the immediate aftermath of his death, he was a divisive and contested When I was training for the Anglican priesthood at figure. We know that as archbishop he had a very bad St Stephen’s House (not long after Romero’s death), I relationship with most of his fellow bishops, who were recall how inspiring it was to encounter this theological ... continued at the foot of page 13 Ø