‘The violent have already lost’
Silvio José Báez, a Nicaraguan bishop living in exile in Miami, offered a Mass over the weekend in which he harshly criticized the Ortega dictatorship.
“Attacking to freedom, denigrating their dignity with falsehoods, raging to humiliate them, treating them cruelly, and condemning them unjustly are homicidal actions, are real crimes,” Báez said during the homily he gave Feb. 12 at St. Agatha Church in Miami.
The prelate stressed that “they are criminals who imprison just people and who deport the citizens of their own country.”
“These abominable acts are not just the whims of deranged people, irregularities in legal proceedings or failure to comply with international norms. No. Offending with rage, slandering for revenge, unjustly imprisoning, viciously torturing and condemning to exile are real crimes and those who act in this way are criminals, who will have to face justice sooner or later,” he said.
Báez pointed out that the authorities in the Nicaraguan regime “are not showing themselves to be strong” but rather are exposing “their weakness and their fear.”
“The violent have already lost, they always lose, because any victory obtained by violence is equivalent to a defeat,” he said.
“Harming people, they harm themselves; condemning the innocent, they condemn themselves; robbing the people of their liberties, they become the most unfortunate slaves,” the bishop added.
When it became known that Ortega’s government had very probably ordered Báez’s assassination, Pope Francis in 2019 ordered the former auxiliary bishop of Managua to leave the country. He has been living in exile in the United States since then.
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.
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