Dictatorship in Nicaragua uses confiscated nuns’ home as migration office

By Walter Sánchez Silva

ACI Prensa Staff, Feb 7, 2024 / 17:30 pm

Researcher and lawyer Martha Patricia Molina has reported that the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua is now using a home where nuns expelled from the country used to live as an office of the Directorate of Migration and Immigration, which is part of the Ministry of the Interior.

The former house of the Sisters of the Fraternity of the Poor Ones of Jesus Christ is in the city of León in Nicaragua’s northwest. The walls are still the same color and inside the nuns’ same furniture still remains. The logo of the Ministry of the Interior is now on the façade.

“Sandinista dictatorship confiscates property of the Sisters Poor of Jesus Christ who in July 2023 were expelled by the Sandinista dictatorship. Police remained inside but now they have turned it into a state institution,” Molina said Feb. 5 on X. “They didn’t even change the color of the walls or the furniture used by the dear nuns. The criminal Ministry of the Interior doing its thing.”

“I am informed that there are plans for upcoming confiscations of religious buildings,” lamented Molina, who is also the author of the report “Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church?”, which compiles the hundreds of attacks by the dictatorship against Catholics in the Central American country.

The nuns, seven Brazilian missionaries, were expelled from Nicaragua on July 2, 2023. They are now living in El Salvador, where they continue their mission.

The Sisters Poor of Jesus Christ arrived in Nicaragua in 2016 from Brazil, where they were founded by Father Gilson Sobreiro. They are also present in Costa Rica, Guatemala, and El Salvador.

Their expulsion from Nicaragua occurred a year after that of a group of Missionaries of Charity, the congregation founded by St. Teresa of Calcutta, who were later welcomed to serve in the Diocese of Tilarán-Liberia in Costa Rica.

This story was first published by ACI Prensa, CNA’s Spanish-language news partner. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

Walter Sánchez Silva is a senior writer for ACI Prensa (https://www.aciprensa.com). With more than 15 years of experience, he has reported from important ecclesial events in Europe, Asia and Latin America during the pontificates of Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. E-mail: walter@aciprensa.com