<% @LANGUAGE=VBScript %> <%Response.Expires=30%> CyberGroup Discussion - Spiritual Innovators
Section Spiritual Innovators

Oscar Romero

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On March 23, 1980, Archbishop Romero made the following appeal to the men of the armed forces:
"Brothers, you came from our own people. You are killing your own brothers. Any human order to kill must be subordinate to the law of God, which says, 'Thou shalt not kill'. No soldier is obliged to obey an order contrary to the law of God. No one has to obey an immoral law. It is high time you obeyed your consciences rather than sinful orders. The church cannot remain silent before such an abomination. ...In the name of God, in the name of this suffering people whose cry rises to heaven more loudly each day, I implore you, I beg you, I order you: stop the repression"
The day following this speech, Archbishop Romero was murdered.
Each of the ClickToSee websites below opens in a new window.
When done, close new window to return to this page.
The website in the book is changed to this. It is a page on the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, an excellent peace site not unlike our United Church's Project Ploughshares.
At Claretian Publishers, a gathering of material from the Religious Task Force on Central America, in honour and memory of Archbishop Oscar Romero of San Salvador. A most extensive list of links on Romero..
A particularly excellent collection of links from an English Catholic Adult Education site.
From the Western Catholic Reporter, a review by Wayne on Oscar Romero: Reflections on His Life and Writings, by Marie Dennis, Renny Golden and Scott Wright.
Quotations

"Peace is not the product of terror or fear. Peace is not the silence of cemeteries. Peace is not the silent result of violent repression. Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all. Peace is dynamism. Peace is generosity. It is right and it is duty."
"God of justice, we repent the sin of our church when it fails to denounce injustice in our world and to call its people to repentance and conversion."

"We cannot do everything and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well. It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for God's grace to enter and do the rest."
"God of love, may we and our church become tools in your hands to help prepare the way for your reign in history. Amen."
"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 (8/6/78)."

St. David's United Church.Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
November 3, 2002