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[Monsignor Romero and Pope John Paul II leaving a private meeting at the Vatican.—[CC0] public domain, Wikimedia File:Óscar Arnulfo Romero with Pope John Paul II.jpg]

EL SALVADOR'S NAME (The Savior) seems ironic considering the violence that has plagued the country since its independence. Throughout the 1970s violence raged—from Communists who wanted to take over the nation and from government forces who murdered anyone seen as a threat to the regime.

The violence cost many people their lives, among them priests and bishops. (The toll of civil war would eventually top seventy thousand killed.) The most infamous murder of a religious figure was the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero on 24 March 1980. He was shot in the heart when he spread his arms to give a closing prayer after saying mass at the Divine Providence Cancer Hospital. Because it was a hot day, the door of the chapel had been left open. The shot came through the open door.

Romero had been famous for speaking out against the violence of both left and right during his weekly broadcast sermons. “We have never preached violence, except the violence of love, which left Christ nailed to a cross,” he said in one of his writings. Romero’s sermons had the attention of virtually everyone in El Salvador, because they were the only authoritative source from which many common people could learn what was happening in their country. Governmental officials also listened because they wanted to keep tabs on what he said.

His last Sunday sermon documented a week of governmental violence that had left many killed. At the outset, he said,

Let no one be offended because we use the divine words read at our Mass to shed light on the social, political and economic situation of our people. Not to do so would be unchristian. Christ desires to unite himself with humanity, so that the light he brings from God might become life for nations and individuals.

He concluded with an appeal to soldiers,

In the name of God, in the name of this suffering people whose cries rise to heaven more loudly each day, I implore you, I beg you, I order you in the name of God: stop the repression!

The next day, he was shot.

On this day 30 March 1980, crowds gathered at the Metropolitan Cathedral for Romero’s funeral. It was to become another day of tragedy in El Salvador. Explosions and shots erupted during the service. Foreign dignitaries huddled in the cathedral while gunshots continued and car bombs exploded all around the sacred building. Terrified people pressed into the church, seeking sanctuary. An hour later, quiet returned. By then forty people were dead, about ten from gunshot wounds, the rest from trampling and suffocation. Many more were injured. 

A Washington Post reporter on the scene saw masked guerrillas but no government troops. The testimony of most eyewitnesses agreed that uniformed soldiers were not involved, although another reporter claimed he saw some shots come from a police building across from the cathedral.

—Dan Graves

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