March 24
St. Oscar Romero
Life (1917-1980)
Óscar Arnulfo Romero y Galdámez was born in the small town of El Salvador known as Ciudad Barrios in 1917. His father trained him to be a carpenter, but from a very early age Óscar knew he wanted to be a priest. He left home at the age of 14, traveling by horse to the large city where he could study. He was ordained a priest for the Diocese of San Salvador in 1942 and quickly became a popular, well-known parish priest and editor of his diocesan newspaper. In 1967, he went to work for the bishops of El Salvador and soon became Bishop of Santiago de Maria. One day in 1975, soldiers raided a village in his diocese and killed many innocent people, claiming they were looking for hidden weapons. Bishop Romero was horrified. At the funerals of these villagers, he spoke about people’s human rights and how the military was wrong in the things they did. He even wrote to the country’s president. When he became Archbishop of San Salvador, the nation’s capital, the government began to turn on the Church, arresting priests and sending them to other countries, and killing people who protested against the leadership. The government killed a priest friend of the archbishop as a warning that he should keep quiet. Archbishop Romero excommunicated the murderers, announcing they could not receive Sacraments in the Church. The government closed Catholic schools, and more priests were tortured and killed, as were teachers of religion. Even possessing a Bible or a hymnbook became illegal. Protest for change must always take place within Gospel teaching, Archbishop Romero told the people of his country, asking them not to be violent. Soon, despite support from many other countries in the world, the archbishop became the target of the Salvadoran government’s anger. On March 24, 1980, he was gunned down by an unknown assassin while celebrating Mass in a small hospital chapel. The day before, he had asked Salvadoran soldiers to obey God and not the government. More than 250,000 Salvadorans attended his funeral, during which a bomb exploded and more people were killed. Many Salvadorans in the following years “disappeared,” never to be seen or heard from again—most likely killed. In 2010, the government of El Salvador formally apologized for the assassination of Archbishop Óscar Romero. In 1997, Pope John Paul II bestowed upon Óscar Romero the title of “Servant of God,” when his cause for canonization was opened. Archbishop Romero was a fearless defender of the poor and suffering in his nation, and he ultimately gave his life for them. In February of 2015, Pope Francis declared Archbishop Romero a martyr. The Church formally beatified him on May 23, 2015. On October 14, 2018, he was canonized, a saint of the Church.
Source: http://saintsresource.com/oscar-romero
Scripture (Rom 8:31b-‐39)
If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not withhold his own Son, but gave him up for all of us, will he not with him also give us everything else? Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Is it Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, ‘For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.’ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Writings
(Year C). During Lent, the catechumens, that is, those who were preparing for baptism, received their proximate preparation and they were then baptized during the Easter Vigil. The Second Vatican Council reminds us of this history of the catechumens: their preparation during Lent and their baptism at the Easter Vigil, and invites us to use this time of Lent to prepare for the renovation of our own baptismal promises (Sacrosanctum Concilium, #64-65; Ad Gentes, 14). Thanks be to God that we are baptized. But how many baptized persons are in need of a good catechumenate so that they can think about the greatness and the responsibility that resulted from their baptism? Those who were baptized during the Easter Vigil understood, better than many Catholics today, the great honor and the meaning of dying and rising with Christ. This is Baptism. This is why the ancient baptismal fonts were in the form of a tomb where the catechumens formed a procession and one by one lowered themselves into the font as if they were to be buried. There the bishop baptized and confirmed them and they came up from the font as one arises from the tomb, dressed in white garments – a precious representation of Christ who arose from his tomb. Dressed in their white garments and carrying a lighted candle in their hand they formed a beautiful procession. They were the neophytes, those who had been baptized and sang with joy about the redemption that was commemorated at the Easter Vigil as they walked and now processed to receive Communion for the first time.
During Easter week they continued to dress in their white garment and thus reaffirmed for themselves their baptismal commitment while at the same time they visited the tombs of the martyrs, of those men and women who knew how to live their baptismal commitment even unto death. How good it would be if during this Easter Vigil we offered repentance for our unfaithfulness to our baptismal promises and firmly resolved to live our baptism more intensely! There could be no better way to participate in this feast of the Risen Lord. Indeed, there is no greater joy for the Divine Redeemer than to imprint in the depths of our souls the reality of his death and resurrection. For the meaning of baptism is rooted in our participation in the death of Jesus and our willingness to die to all that is evil in life, that is, to detach ourselves from selfishness, injustice, hatred, violence, all that is evil and diabolical and all that is perverse. On the other hand, our baptism is also rooted in our resurrection to a new life, to a life of holiness, simplicity, humility, chastity and all those virtues that gave life to the holy souls. All the baptized are called to be saints. On this night when we celebrate the Easter Vigil we are once again invited to make a resolution to be holy, to be faithful and consistent with our baptism. It is here, together at Jesus’ tomb, as we await his resurrection, that we examine our life and our commitments to him. We do not want to be Judas nor the cowardly apostles. We want to be faithful today and tomorrow. The time demands this faithfulness. These moments do not allow us to live as Catholics who are asleep, nor is it the time to accommodate Catholicism to our own way of thinking or our individual whim. The hour has come when we must say with Jesus: whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters (Matthew 12:31). This is the hour for integrity and laying down one’s life. We must constantly recall the fact that Christ died and was buried, and allow these realities to blossom into a resolution to live an integral Catholicism and to accept the ultimate consequence of our fidelity. It would be very fruitful to reflect on this at the Lord’s tomb as we await the hour of his resurrection. (Message during the Easter Triduum)
Musical Selection (Michael Joncas)
Collect
All powerful God,
who called Oscar Romero to give his life
for the poor and down-trodden in El Salvador:
grant that we may be united in serving your people
for the cause of justice and peace.
Grant this through Jesus Christ, your Son our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, now and for ever. Amen. (English Missal)