Oscar Romero

Oscar Arnulfo Romero was born into a family of ten in 1917, in El Salvador. His father was in charge of the local telegraph office. Sometimes the young Oscar helped his father to deliver telegrams. He learned to be a carpenter, making tables, chairs and doors. He was a quick learner and talented, but it surprised no one when the young Oscar said he wanted to be a priest.

     Oscar entered a local seminary at the early age of 13. Later, when his mother was ill and they needed money for medicine, Oscar left the seminary for three months to work in the gold mine in Potosí, where he earned about 4p a day. He returned to the seminary, then completed his studies in Rome. He had to wait a year to be ordained because he was younger than the required age. His father and brother died while he was in Rome.

     Oscar was ordained in 1942, and returned to South America to become a parish priest in Anamorós. He moved to San Miguel, where he remained for 20 years. He embraced a simple lifestyle and was soon famous for his sermons but also did a lot of parish work visiting prisons, organising catechism classes and working with others in the Church to provide help and food for the poor.

Oscar was appointed secretary of the Bishops’ Conference for El Salvador in 1966, and became an auxiliary bishop in 1970. In 1974, he was appointed Bishop to the poor, rural region of Santiago de María. He became Archbishop of San Salvador in 1977.

     Oscar Romero’s ministry was distinguished by a particular attention to the most poor and marginalised. In a famous sermon he asked, ‘When I help the poor, they call me a saint. Why then, when I ask why they are poor, do they call me a communist?’

     All this time, violence was increasing in El Salvador as the United States funded right-wing extremists to counter the ‘communists’ they feared south of their border. Soon, the El Salvador government were killing those who stood up for their rights. Death squads committed murder in the
cities while soldiers killed as they wished in the countryside.

     Oscar continued to speak out against social injustice, poverty, assassinations and torture. He demanded justice and recompense for all the atrocities committed by the army and police, and he set up projects and pastoral programmes to support the victims. He became a catalyst for radical moral prophecy both inside the Church and out. The press attacked him vehemently and called him a communist. He knew his life was in danger but he continued.

     The death threats multiplied and the atmosphere was charged. In a sermon on 23 March 1980, Oscar ordered the army to stop their killing. He said, ‘In the name of God, and in the name of this suffering people whose cries rise to heaven more loudly each day, I beg you, I implore you, I order you, in the name of God, stop the repression!’ He was murdered the very next day while celebrating
Holy Communion in the chapel of the Hospital of Divine Providence. Many believe his murder was funded by the US Government.

     His funeral was celebrated on Palm Sunday. He was later declared a martyr of the Church, beatified in 2015 and canonised in 2018. 

For more information, please visit the following websites:

http://www.romerotrust.org.uk/who-was-romero
https://cafod.org.uk/News/International-news/Oscar-Romero-life-timeline

https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/st-oscar-romero