Oscar Romero, martyred this day in 1980

Óscar Romero (1917–1980) became Archbishop of San Salvador in 1977.  

Though theologically conservative, he became an outspoken critic of the way the state and military supported the privileged, the wealthy and the powerful while the majority of the people remained in abject poverty. He spoke up on behalf of the poor who were being slaughtered by government backed death squads. 

Romero himself was assassinated on this day, March 24, 1980 while saying Mass in a small hospital chapel. He was killed by a single rifle bullet, his blood pouring out upon the altar. 

In 1997 Romero’s cause for beatification and canonisation was opened, and Pope John Paul II bestowed upon him the title of Servant of God. The canonisation process continues. Romero was declared a Martyr by Pope Francis on 3 February 2015, paving the way for his beatification, which took place on 23 May 2015. Oscar Romero is honoured by other Christians, notably the Church of England which commemorates him in its Calendar. He is also one of the ten 20th century martyrs who are depicted in statues above the Great West Door of Westminster Abbey, unveiled in July 1988. 

Here are some of his sayings from The Violence of Love, which can be downloaded as a pdf book HERE. 

I cry out against injustice,
but only to say to the unjust:
Be converted!
I cry out in the name of suffering,
of those who suffer injustice,
but only to say to the criminals:
Be converted!
Do not be wicked!
(December 1, 1977)

* * * * *

We human beings cannot produce our land’s liberation.
We Salvadorans are unable to save our country
with our own human powers.
But if we hope for a liberation to come from Christ,
the Redeemer,
then we can.
This is the church’s hope.
This is why I preach much faith in Christ.
He died to pay for all injustices
and rose to bury in his tomb all evil
and become the redemption of all those who suffer.
He is hope and eternal life.
(December 1, 1977)

* * * * *

A religion of Sunday Mass but of unjust weeks
does not please the Lord.
A religion of much praying but with hypocrisy in the heart
is not Christian.
A church that sets itself up only to be well off,
to have a lot of money and comfort,
but that forgets to protest injustices,
would not be the true church of our divine Redeemer.
(December 4, 1977)

* * * * *

This is the sermon given at a service in Westminster Abbey to mark the 30th anniversary of the martyrdom of Archbishop Oscar Romero, 28 March 2010 by then Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend and Right Honourable Dr Rowan Williams, 

Sentir con la Iglesia: ‘feeling with the Church’.  This was Oscar Romero’s motto as a bishop – you’ll see it in many photographs inscribed on the episcopal mitre he wore.  It is in fact an ancient phrase, very often used to express the ideal state of mind for a loyal Catholic Christian; indeed, it’s usually been translated as ‘thinking with the Church’.  It can be used and has been used simply to mean having the same sentiments as the Church’s teaching authority.

But the life and death of Monseñor Romero take us to a far deeper level of meaning.  Here was a man who was by no means a temperamental revolutionary ...

Go HERE for the rest of Rowan Williams’ sermon. 

New memorial to C.S. Lewis in Westminster Abbey

Three days ago (Friday 22nd November - St Cecilia’s Day), was the fiftieth anniversary of C.S. Lewis’ death, and a special service was held in Westminster Abbey to unveil a memorial stone to Lewis in Poets’ Corner. The event was part of a two-day conference in commemoration of the life and impact of C.S. Lewis.

Go HERE to download a pdf of the service booklet.

The following is the explanatory introduction to the booklet by Dr Michael Ward, Senior Research Fellow, Blackfriars Hall,Oxford:

THE C.S. LEWIS MEMORIAL STONE

"I believe in Christianity as I believe that the Sun has risen, not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else."

Of the countless fine phrases that Lewis spoke and wrote, this one has been chosen as the inscription on his memorial in Poets’Corner. It links together many areas of his life and work. The sentence comes from an address entitled ‘Is Theology Poetry?’ The answer Lewis gives to his own question is that although Christian theology is not merely poetry it is still poetic and therefore must be received with an imaginative, as well as a rational, embrace. Millions of readers who have moved about the worlds of Narnia, Perelandra, and Glome know the ripe fruits of his imaginative engagement with theological themes and the power of his poetic prose. The address was one of many he gave to the Socratic Club, the forum for debate between Christians and non-Christians, of which he was President. Thus the inscription points to his role as an apologist who publicly - and not without professional cost - defended the faith, ‘following the argument,’ as Socrates said, ‘wherever it should lead’. Lewis was a rationalist as well as a romantic. The sentence is straightforwardly confessional, marking the centrality of his faith at a personal level. ‘I never knew a man more thoroughly converted,’ remembers Walter Hooper, to whom thanks are especially due at this anniversary time for doing so much over the last half century to keep Lewis’s memory green. The Sun is there, aptly enough, for ‘the heavens are telling the glory of God’, in the words of the psalm that Lewis regarded as the psalter’s greatest lyric. ‘Everything else’ is there too, because his vision was all-embracing. Angels, poached eggs, mice and their tails, Golders Green, birdsong, buses, Balder, the great nebula in Andromeda: all are there and all may be redeemed for us in Christ - as long as the Cross comes before the Crown.

That Lewis spoke these words at a debating society in Oxford reminds us also of his long association with that university and of his distinguished academic career. If Oxford could have been picked up and deposited in his native County Down, he said, it would have realised his idea of heaven. He lived in Oxford all his adult life - even while happily employed as a professor at Cambridge - and died there three years after his beloved wife, Joy, at his home, The Kilns, on this day in 1963.The 22nd November is the feast of St Cecilia, patron saint of music and musicians. Lewis’s great comedic character, Screwtape, despises music as a direct insult to the realism, dignity, and austerity of Hell. Lewis himself believed its joy to be the serious business of Heaven. He had, in the words of Donne, ‘tuned his instrument’ at Heaven’s door and knew with greater intensity than most the longing to cross the threshold and join the heavenly harmony. Fifty years ago, the door on which he had been knocking all his life opened at last.‘Nothing makes a man so noticeable as vanishing!’ Lewis once observed, but he had not envisioned how true this would be in his own case. In conversation with Walter Hooper, he predicted that sales of his works would decline steeply after his death. Hooper countered, ‘No,they won’t. And you know why? Your books are too good, and people are not that stupid.’ It was one of the rare occasions when Lewis’s foresight failed him. Hence, it may be safely assumed that he would find today’s service completely surprising, but also - it may be hoped - not wholly displeasing. Come, let us worship God, wonderful in his saints!

C.S. Lewis

Westminster Abbey