The vice president of the Spanish Episcopal Conference and archbishop of Madrid, Cardinal Carlos Osoro Sierra, will preside this Sunday, September 4, at a mass for Nicaragua organized by Nicaraguan exiles in the Santísimo Redentor parish in the Spanish capital, as he was able to learn exclusively Article 66.
The Eucharist for the Church and the people of Nicaragua is being organized by residents and exiles who live in the capital of Spain and has received the institutional support of the pontifical foundation “Aid to the Church in Need.”
Related news: Nicaraguans in Madrid will celebrate mass in solidarity with the Catholic Church, persecuted by Ortega
“Faced with the escalation of repression against the Catholic Church in Nicaragua, and with the arbitrary detention of Bishop Monsignor Rolando Álvarez and other priests and laity; With a group of Nicaraguans we know here in the parish, we decided in the face of this situation to give a prayerful response to this drama that is being experienced,” said Redemptorist priest José Miguel de Haro, pastor of the Santísimo Redentor church in Madrid.
The Spanish Catholic Church has been one of the most belligerent in its solidarity with the persecuted Church of Nicaragua. Bishops such as Osoro, Juan José Omella (Barcelona), José María Gil Tamayo (coadjutor of Granada), Carlos Escribano (Zaragoza) and José Ángel Sainz Meneses (Seville), have expressed their express condemnation of the religious persecution organized by the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo in Nicaragua.
It should be noted that Cardinal Osoro Sierra is one of the cardinals closest to Pope Francis and one of his main sources of information within the Spanish Church.
“I pray for the people of Nicaragua and for the Church that pilgrims in the country, which, with its testimony, makes the Gospel present as Saint Dominic de Guzmán requested,” wrote the Catholic hierarch from his Twitter account on August 8.
Catholic media support
The Catholic media in Spain are closely following the religious persecution that Nicaragua is experiencing, according to this media outlet.
Today, in the evening program of the Spanish bishops’ radio station, the Nicaraguan community in exile was able to reiterate their invitation to next Sunday’s mass and they assured that the Nicaraguan socio-political crisis, which began in 2018, is alarming.
«The situation in Nicaragua is alarming, sad, overwhelming, dramatic in every way. It is almost a helpless situation. We are asking the international community not to forget Nicaragua (…) As much as you try to describe it, it is impossible,” said Deborah García, one of the organizers of the Eucharist for Nicaragua, in the noon program of the COPE radio network. .
