The Martyr’s Progress
By Fr Anthony Egan SJ – On March 24, 1980, a great, holy man was martyred. Oscar Romero, the Catholic archbishop of San Salvador in El Salvador, was shot by agents of a right-wing death squad while celebrating Mass in a hospital chapel. On May 23 he will be formally beatified.

Pilgrim holds a portrait of Archbishop Oscar Romero during beatification Mass May 23 in the Divine Savior of the World square in San Salvador. (CNS photo/Lissette Lemus)
A cautious, quite conservative bishop when he was appointed to the largest diocese in El Salvador in February 1977, Arcbishop Romero had always spoken about Catholic Social Teaching and the need for justice, albeit vaguely some might call it diplomatic, others simply timid or appeasing.
In the month of his appointment the ruling elite had stolen a general election by ballot fraud. Civil society, including progressives in the Church, had protested. Then, on March 12, 1977, Jesuit Father Rutillo Grande and two laypeople were murdered. This changed Romero. Radically.
Archbishop Romero knew Fr Grande and respected Fr Grande’s opinions and, above all, his integrity. When the government tried to suggest that Fr Grande and his companions been armed and had tried to fire upon security forces, Archbishop Romero’s response was blunt: You are liars!
From that moment on, and despite a Salvadoran bishops’ conference that was predominantly politically cautious to reactionary, Archbishop Romero became the most consistent, vocal and public voice of resistance to economic injustice and human rights violations in the country.
He also became a beloved figure among fellow activists, progressive clergy who had previously dreaded his appointment, and the poor majority of Salvadorans.
Within days of his violent death he was being proclaimed Saint Romero of the Americas’ throughout Latin America and many other parts of the world.
In the Middle Ages this would have been called canonisation by acclamation. But in the contemporary Catholic Church, not altogether unknown for fast-tracking sainthoods, the process has taken more than 35 years. One may ask: why?
One argument has been that since his death has been politicised there had to be a cooling-off period. This does not work. Almost all martyrdoms have a political dimension to them. In Romero’s case it was simply that he has become a hero of the secular left, as much as a hero of those in the Church who struggle for social justice.
Others suggest that since he was murdered by people who were, at least nominally, Catholic, he could not really be called a martyr. Nonsense! By killing Romero for his Catholic Social Teaching-based advocacy, they were in effect attacking a central dimension of faith itself.
Some have also said that it’s because he was close to many who embraced liberation theology, which was unpopular in Vatican circles. It is certainly true that many politically conservative Catholics had denounced him for that in his lifetime. His orthodoxy was questioned.
But a more than cursory analysis of his speeches and writings reveal rather a consistent, contextual application of Catholic Social Teaching just like Pope Francis who unblocked the canonisation process.
Whatever the case, we have now officially caught up with the sensus fidelium. And it’s about time too!
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