Archbishop Romero, Martyr of Salvador (English and Spanish Edition)

Much of the hagiography written for Romero subsequent to his assassination by US Forces in his hospital chapel March 24, 1980 received the grace of passing time for reflection and peace and comprehension. This insightful and generous book was written in the anguish of the first wave of his criminal and unholy death at Mass moments after his final homily. Augustinian Father Erdozain who worked closely with Archbishop Romero's pastoral office of communications rushed into preparing this book for publication, and each page drips with his prayerful tears. Everyone in El Salvador expected the Archbishop would be slain by the government forces, but the shock and awe and anguish of this actually occurring left everyone as stunned and hollow as the JFK assassination, as the one who called us all to our greatest ideals was sacrificed by those who most opposed those religious and ethical and spiritual and moral ideals. This state of pain and shock fills this book written so soon after the Achbishop's murder in the chapel. When Pope John Paul II first visited Central America, he bravely opposed the SAlvadoran military dictatorship's direct orders and had his driver take him immediately from the airport to pray at Archbishop Romero's tomb inside the Cathedral. I too prayed there, and left votos and intentions there, and once had a photo now lost of the young Pope John Paul praying, kneeling there. In order to truly feel the truth of that time, to know the Archbishop and his courage and wisdom and strength and spirituality, to know how he moved millions of Catholics, to see the reality, read this book. This book comes hot off the press in the immediate wake of his slaughter, and very soon after the torture, rape and killing of the four American churchwomen, to whom it is dedicated. Every American Catholic must read this and weep, and pray for the swift canonization of our holy martyrs of America. An excellent if slender volume from the great Catholic publishing house Orbis Books, based at the Maryknoll New York Catholic Missionary Society, to which two of those holy sacrificed nuns belonged: Sister Ita Ford and Sister Maura Clarke. An essential addition to any collection of Catholic History and hagiography. They say the blood of the martyrs is the seed of vocations. Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, pray for us.