Nicaraguan Bishop Stays Imprisoned, 222 Inmates Expelled -

nicaraguan bishop stays imprisoned

NICARAGUAN BISHOP STAYS IMPRISONED. Most of the 94 political opponents who have lost their status as citizens have already fled the country. They are joined in exile by 222 former prisoners whom dictator Daniel Ortega deported last week. Plus the nuns and missionaries whom Ortega has expelled since the mass 2018 protests against his rule.

For now, one Catholic bishop, Rolando Alvarez is staying in prison on a 26-year sentence for “treason.” Because he refused to board the flight that took the other 222 away. They included priests, political leaders, activists and students, all of them considered political prisoners. On TV Ortega called the released prisoners “criminal mercenaries” working for foreign powers.

From exile in Miami, Nicaraguan Biship Silvio Baez praised Alvarez for taking “moral high ground.” He tweeted that he believed that Alvarez would eventually gain freedom. But what would he do? The Sandinista-dominated Congress has ordered over 1,000 NGO’s to close. Including Mother Teresa’s charity.

190 attacks against the Catholic Church in Nicaragua

And since 2018, more than 190 attacks have been perpetrated against the Catholic Church. A lawyer with the Pro-Transparency and Anti-Corruption Observatory has said, “The police are acting like a criminal group that does not submit to the rule of law.” So Alvarez would be re-entering a minefield if he did not agree to go into exile.

Still, he said he chose to stay in a Nicaraguan prison in solidarity with other Catholics facing repression.

Pope Francis made a public plea for “a respectful and peaceful coexistence” that has gone unheeded. We must pray that God will loosen Ortega’s grip on power so that godly voices may be heard again.

Photo: Ramírez 22 nic, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons