In a May 2016 video message, Sandoval, the archbishop emeritus of Guadalajara, said that according to information he has, the killing was orchestrated by the director of the Federal Judicial Police, who in turn got his orders from the attorney general. The case remains unsolved.
The CCM director, Father Omar Sotelo, said that the report, which can be accessed on the center’s website, is a way of collaborating “with the initiative for the (July 10) Day for Prayer for Peace in Mexico” called by the Mexican Bishops’ Conference, the Conference of Major Superiors of Religious of Mexico, and the Mexican Province of the Society of Jesus.
Church leaders have asked that “all the priests, religious men and women who have been murdered in the country be remembered” in all the Masses to be celebrated on July 10.
They also encouraged the faithful that “as a prophetic sign of our Church, in the Eucharist on July 31 we pray for the victimizers, we pray for their lives and the conversion of their hearts, we extend our hand to receive them with a repentant heart into the house of God.”
In a statement to ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language sister news agency, Sotelo noted that “this invitation to the Day for Peace in Mexico is a great opportunity that all Mexicans have, not only in the Catholic Church, but each and every one, to fellowship, to join together and, in one way or another, weave these bridges that can help us fight against this violence.”
The violence Mexico is currently experiencing, he said, “comes precisely from dehumanization. There’s nothing else, there’s no other word: it comes from the dehumanization of the human being, from that indifference.”