Martyrs ‘continue to give their lives’

ON FRIDAY last week, 500 pilgrims from El Salvador met Pope Francis in Rome to give thanks for the ­beatification of Archbishop Oscar Romero, writes James Roberts. The Pope called Romero, who was beatified in El Salvador on 23 May 2015, a “good pastor, full of love for God and close to his brothers who, living the dynamism of the Beatitudes, gave his life in a violent way while celebrating the Eucharist, the supreme sacrifice of love, sealing with his own blood the Gospel that he announced.”

Francis concluded with some unscripted remarks. “I wish to add something we are forgetting,” he said. “The martyrdom of Mgr Romero [on 24 March 1980] was not fulfilled at the moment of his death – it was a martyrdom of witness, of prior suffering and prior persecution, up to his death. But even afterwards  – I was a young priest and a witness to this – he was defamed, slandered.

“After having given his life,” Francis continued, “[a martyr] continues to give it by allowing himself to be assailed by mis­understanding and slander. This gives me strength. Only God knows the stories of those people who have given their lives, who have died, and continue to be stoned with the hardest stone that exists in the world: language.”

n On the previous day, the Pope received the participants in the Radio Maria 6th World Congress, which took place at Collevallenza, Italy from 25 to 30 October. Among those attending were the presidents and priests who direct the 75 Radio Maria broadcasting stations around the world and the further six that will shortly become live. “The spread of Radio Maria in environments very diverse in terms of culture, language and tradition is good news for all as it shows that, when we have the courage to propose high-profile content from a clearly Christian position, the initiative is well received,” the Pope said.