Daniel Ortega once again attacked the Catholic Church and described it as “a mafia” that does not represent the principles of God or those of Christ.
“They are a mafia, look at the crimes they have committed, how many crimes they have committed and crimes continue to emerge every day,” he questioned in his speech during the commemoration of the 89th anniversary of the death of Augusto C. Sandino.
“Who chooses the Pope? How many votes does the Pope get among what is the Christian people? If we are going to talk about democracy, the people should first elect the priests of the people,” he said.
He immediately added “let the people decide and not the mafia that is organized in the Vatican.”
“They present themselves as saints, they present themselves as representatives of God, no. They have not complied with that principle of representing God. Much less to represent Christ, ”he insisted.
The president, who on February 9 pointed out to the Bishop Rolando Álvarez of “superb”, “energúmeno” and “insane”, for refusing exile, he assured “Christ was never arrogant, Christ was never aggressive. Christ was always supportive.” A day later, in an act of revenge, the Ortega justice system condemned the priest in an express trial without guarantees.
“His message was of peace and then they tortured and murdered him (…) but Christ rose from the dead in the towns and lives in the Christian towns. Not because of the example that the bishops, the cardinals and the Popes can give, who are a mafia”, reiterated Ortega.
The auxiliary bishop of Managua, Monsignor Silvio Báez, who is in exile and was recently stripped of his nationality, wrote on his Twitter account: “How much ignorance, how much lies and how much cynicism! A dictator giving democracy lessons; someone who exercises power illegitimately, criticizing the authority that Jesus granted to his Church; an atheist, corrupt and criminal, confessing inspired by Christ”.
How much ignorance, how much lies and how much cynicism! A dictator giving democracy lessons; someone who exercises power illegitimately, criticizing the authority that Jesus granted to his Church; an atheist, corrupt and criminal, confessing inspired by Christ.
— Silvio José Báez (@silviojbaez) February 22, 2023
On February 12, the Pope Francis regretted the sentence to 26 years and four months imposed by the Ortega regime against Monsignor Rolando Álvarez, bishop of the Diocese of Matagalpa and apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Estelí and the exile of 222 political prisoners.
“The news that comes from Nicaragua has hurt me not a little, and I cannot help but remember with concern the Bishop of Matagalpa, Monsignor Rolando Álvarez, whom I love very much,” the pontiff said after the Sunday Angelus.
Ortega gives religion lessons after persecuting the Church
The president who has persecuted the Catholic Church in Nicaragua — 19 priests and two bishops are in exile, are “stateless” or are in prison— assures that he does have Christ in his heart and because of him, he is “revolutionary”.
“I am a revolutionary thanks to Christ, and after being a revolutionary I got to know revolutionary thought in the world, I got to know the revolutions in the world where the poor were fighting, but the inner strength that I have had all these years to survive I owe it to Christ ”, said the dictator, who is accused of committing crimes against humanity against the Nicaraguans who protested against him.
Ortega indicated that he grew up Catholic, but “I never had affection or respect for most priests and religious, with exceptions.” Among them the Spanish priest Gaspar García Laviana, who died in 1978.
“What respect can I have for the bishops I met in Nicaragua? If they were Somocistas. I was a child when Somoza’s funeral happened and there the bishops were burying Somoza as a prince of the Church, as if he were a cardinal of the Church, simply because Somoza was a henchman who gave all the facilities to the Church, and I was a server, an agent, an instrument of Yankee imperialism,” he said.
Ortega assured that although he does not believe in the Church, “he has Christ in his heart” and for him “socialism is Christianity.”
Daniel Ortega’s speech lasted an hour in which he reviewed the history of the conquest of America and the complicity of the Catholic Church.
In the historical review, he recalled the crimes of the Catholic Church and the Catholic kings who “burned those who did not think like them. They burned Joan of Arc, a true heroine, and how many scientists and how many people who were contributing were also burned,” said the dictator who holds 35 political prisoners and stripped 317 Nicaraguans of their nationality who have denounced the human rights violations committed by his regimen.
In September 2022, Ortega accused the Catholic Church of being a “perfect dictatorship, a tyranny” that has no authority to speak of democracy. In that speech he accused some Nicaraguan bishops of coup plotters and cover-ups. “As a Catholic I don’t feel represented by everything we know about that terrible story, but also by the fact that we hear you talk about democracy and they don’t practice democracy,” he said.
Honor electoral magistrates
At the beginning of the presidential ceremony on February 21, Ortega awarded the Augusto Sandino order in its highest degree to five regime officials, describing them as “loyal and faithful in love, sovereignty, and dignity to Nicaragua,” including several sanctioned by the United States. , the European Union for their complicity in the crimes committed by the regime.
The decorated Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) magistrates were the president of that institution, Brenda Rocha, the vice president, Lumberto Campbell, and magistrate Alma Nubia Baltodano.
The Attorney General of the Republic, Ana Julia Guido, who directs a key institution in the execution of spurious trials against political prisoners, was also decorated.
The former deputy and diplomat of the regime, Orlando Tardencilla, was also decorated.
Hours before the act, the National Assembly held a solemn session in honor of Sandino, which was attended by representatives of the different branches of the State, Army and Police.
During the session, the head of Parliament, the Sandinista Gustavo Porras, highlighted Sandino’s patriotism and US anti-imperialism in his speech. “The general (Sandino) spoke to all Nicaraguans without distinction, of course, to be a Nicaraguan every Nicaraguan must have a dignified, honest and honorable position against the invading Yankee,” he indicated in reference to the illegal proceedings against 317 citizens classified as “traitors to the homeland” by the Ortega regime who were stripped of their nationality.
For his part, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Denis Moncada, told journalists after the solemn session that “Sandino taught us how to be dignified children of Nicaragua, how not to be traitors, defenders of the homeland, of sovereignty, of national dignity ”.
*With information from EFE*
