Based on the Gospel according to Saint John, where Jesus said goodbye to his disciples, assuring them that they would not be left alone and that he would send them the “Spirit of truth”, Monsignor Silvio Báez, auxiliary bishop of Managua, taught in his homily this Sunday, that “today our society lives with a deep sense of orphanhood.”
Referring to the biblical passage, Báez explained that an orphan is not only a minor who has lost his father and mother, but that “a person is also an orphan if he feels alone, has no one to protect him or lives with a feeling of helplessness”.
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He also emphasized that today’s society lives “a deep sense of orphanhood,” this, according to the prelate, due “to globalization, the rapid evolution of technology and the disappearance of traditional institutions (which) have led to the loss of values and cultural, religious and social referents that previously provided security”.
Alluding to the sociopolitical crisis that Nicaragua is experiencing, at the hands of the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, the bishop stressed that “another form of orphanhood” in society is the lack of authentic leadership, “especially in the political sphere.”
“We cannot forget either the orphanhood imposed by the tyrannical powers on the people through jail, exile, persecution and even the unjust stripping of one’s citizenship,” he remarked.
“In worldliness there is not the Spirit of truth”
Referring to Jesus’ promise to send “the Spirit of truth”, the religious recalled that in “the Gospel of John calls the social structures and currents of thought that oppose truth, justice, the world” to fraternity, to peace and to love».
He stressed that “in worldliness there is not the Spirit of truth. Those who belong to this dark and inhuman system cannot perceive the Spirit, cannot receive it, do not know it and do not even want to know it».
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Addressing the parishioners, Monsignor Báez asserted that “today more than ever we need the Spirit of truth so as not to fall into ideological blindness or be subjected to the tyranny of falsehood.”
He insisted that human beings currently live in a society “in which attempts are made to present what is false as true and what is immoral as moral; the lack of respect is called sincerity and the dark manipulations behind people’s backs, political strategies».
Referring to the dictators of Nicaragua, the hierarch affirmed that “the powerful intend to impose their cynical discourse as an instrument of domination, they invent historical narratives that falsify the facts to dominate the conscience of the people and present themselves as messianic leaders to ensure popularity.”
«In the midst of so much lies and confusion, we need the Spirit of truth that Jesus has promised us. When we are blinded by ideologies or we resist love, the Spirit makes us understand that arrogance, mental rigidity and selfishness do no good to anyone and distance us from God (cf. Jn 15,9)”, he said.
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The bishop’s message concluded by encouraging that Jesus “assures us that we are not alone, that he has not left us orphans, helpless and at the mercy of the risks of worldliness and the hostility of evil.”
“We are not orphans, let us not live like orphans. Let us open our hearts to the Spirit, who is the tenderness and strength, the comfort and the truth of God. With him our life will become a smile, solidarity, compassion and forgiveness. With him we will be passionate witnesses of the light, sowers of peace and prophets of hope,” she exhorted.
