The priests of the Diocese of Estel in Nicaragua demanded that the leaders of Daniel Ortega’s dictatorial government convert, grant them the freedom to carry out their work without interference, and free Rolando José lvarez Lagos, their apostolic administrator and the bishop of Matagalpa, who is currently being held under house arrest.
“We request that you repent and quit bothering us. Work with us in peace! If you convert from the heart, the Lord will have pity on you and free the bishop, the priests, and the laypeople, the Estel clergy said in a statement made public on August 23.
The message was published on Facebook in response to numerous assaults by the Ortega dictatorship against the Catholic Church throughout the nation, particularly in Matagalpa, where lvarez was kidnapped from the chancery in the middle of the night and put under house arrest in Managua after being falsely accused of supporting violent groups to topple the regime.
He was transferred to the notorious El Chipote jail in Managua together with other priests, seminarians, and a layperson who had all been imprisoned violently for days in the chancery.
The Estel clergy reminded the government that the “incitement to hatred and violence” actually happened “when Mr. Daniel Ortega, in the official act of July 19, 2018 (celebrating the victory of the Sandinista revolution in 1979), publicly accused some bishops of being coup plotters, terrorists,” according to the Estel clergy.
The clergy said: “Since then, there have been many occasions… when they have hurled all kind of insults, offences, and defamations, not just at the bishops, but also at us priests.”
The priests said, “Our nature and calm pastoral vocation have made us quietly tolerate such barbarisms.”
The cleric said that there was no coup d’état since “coups d’état are carried out by militaries, and here the army hasn’t done a coup to anybody,” which makes the claims against the Ortega regime, “such as being coup plotters,” “unfounded.” That just exists in your head.
The statement said, “What occurred here in 2018 was a protest by the people, which ultimately resulted in the deaths of a significant number of young Nicaraguans.”
The Estel priests chastised the government for “doing whatever they want with the laws, they distort them, they make them by decree to arrest people,” and urged that they “respect the Political Constitution of the Republic.”
“They are treating everyone of us the same way they are treating Bishop Lázarez, the apostolic leader Pope Francis selected for us. He is an innocent person with a clear conscience who hasn’t committed any crimes, they claimed.
The priests emphasised that since “only the Church is capable of criticising its ongoing breaches of human rights,” the dictatorship is “persecuting the Church for her prophetic mission.”
The priests emphasised, “When they persecute the Church, it is Christ himself whom they persecute.”
The statement reads, “We will keep praying for the Lord to give them his Holy Spirit and for them to be able to right all these barbaric acts that are being committed against our Nicaraguan Church.
The priests from Nicaragua concluded by thanking “all the bishops’ conferences that have expressed solidarity” and expressing their gratitude for “the closeness, grief, and care of dear Pope Francis.”
The statement concludes, “We reiterate our closeness and our unwavering support, not only to our apostolic administrator, to the priests, and to the laity, who are wrongfully detained, but also to the other bishops of the Nicaraguan Bishops’ Conference, who experience as personally done to them the abuse that has been done to their brother in the episcopate.