Pastor Chris Experiences El Salvador

For my next two blogs I want to share with you two of the more powerful experiences I had during my time in El Salvador.

Before we got to work on the construction site, our contacts in El Salvador wanted to share with us a little bit about their identity and their history. This took us to "La Divina Providencia," a hospital for hospice patients. At this exact place, in the chapel, on March 24, 1980, while leading mass, Romero was assassinated. Romero was associated with the "Liberation Theology" movement and this did not sit well with the government. Romero argued that the way the government was treating the poor was unjust and conflicted with the teachings of Jesus. Romero went so far as to ask Salvadoran soldiers to obey God's calling, a higher calling, and not the government's orders to further violate the citizen's basic human rights.

As I reflected on this powerful site (so powerful they still have the clothes that Romero was wearing when he was shot in the chest, (bullet hole included) I was left asking the question, "when are we called to advocate for change?" Thankfully we don't experience the same evil that plagued Romero's land, but are we as Christians called to speak up for what is right and condemn what is evil? Think of Bonhoeffer who felt so compelled by the evils of Hitler that he, as a pacifist even, plotted Hitler's assassination. Do we have a mandate, instilled by our faith, to live up to a similar calling even if it might cost us our lives?