Óscar Romero

The assassination on March 12, 1977, of the Jesuit priest Rutilio Grande, a friend of Romero and committed to the peasantry, marked a decisive turning point in his episcopate. Having become archbishop only a few days earlier, Romero took up the defense of the poor, the peasants, and the victims of repression with increasing vigor. Every Sunday, his homilies, broadcast by the diocesan radio station YSAX and listened to by a large portion of the population, denounced by name the disappearances, tortures, kidnappings, and murders committed in a climate of growing political violence. He thus became the "voice of the voiceless" (la voz de los sin voz). Romero also addressed direct appeals to the authorities and the international community, notably writing to the President of the United States to request an end to military aid to the Salvadoran government. On March 23, 1980, in his final Sunday homily, he issued a now-famous appeal to soldiers and security forces, begging them to cease the repression and to no longer obey orders contrary to the law of God. This public denunciation is widely considered to have precipitated his assassination the following day.

The spiritual journey of Óscar Romero is characterized by a pastoral conversion that was not a break with his traditional faith, but its deepening in the light of the suffering of his people. A man of prayer, attached to the Eucharist and to Marian devotion, Romero read the Gospel as a call to defend the dignity of the poorest, in line with the social teaching of the Church and the preferential option for the poor affirmed by the Latin American bishops. His reputation for holiness spread during his lifetime and amplified immediately after his death, perceived by many faithful as a true martyrdom suffered out of fidelity to the Gospel. Conscious of the threats that weighed upon him, he declared, in an interview granted shortly before his death, that in the event of assassination he would "resurrect in the Salvadoran people," expressing both his Christian hope and his union with his people. The Church officially recognized the dimension of martyrdom in his death, that is to say his murder "in hatred of the faith," which opened the way to his beatification and then his canonization.

The cause for the beatification and canonization of Óscar Romero followed a long path. On February 3, 2015, Pope Francis recognized the martyrdom of Romero, killed "in hatred of the faith." He was beatified on May 23, 2015, in San Salvador, during a Mass presided over by Cardinal Angelo Amato on behalf of Pope Francis, which gathered a considerable crowd at the Plaza Salvador del Mundo. In view of the canonization, the Church recognized a miracle attributed to his intercession: the unexplained healing of Cecilia Maribel Flores de Rivas, a Salvadoran woman who was gravely ill after giving birth in 2015, whose recovery was judged scientifically inexplicable by a decree promulgated on March 6, 2018, with the authorization of Pope Francis. Óscar Romero was canonized on October 14, 2018, in Saint Peter's Square in Rome, by Pope Francis, during the same celebration as Pope Paul VI and several other saints. His liturgical feast is set for March 24, the day of his death.

The legacy of Óscar Romero extends far beyond the borders of El Salvador and the Catholic Church. Considered one of the great spiritual figures of 20th-century Latin America, he has become a universal symbol of the defense of the poor and human rights. In 1980, his death was perceived throughout the world as the martyrdom of a pastor killed for denouncing injustice; in 1993, the United Nations Truth Commission attributed the organization of his assassination to forces linked to far-right death squads, notably Roberto d'Aubuisson. Romero is commemorated not only by the Catholic Church but also by other Christian denominations; his statue is among those of the 20th-century martyrs adorning the facade of Westminster Abbey in London. In 2010, the United Nations General Assembly established March 24, the day of his death, as the International Day for the Right to the Truth Concerning Gross Human Rights Violations. The Metropolitan Cathedral of San Salvador, where he is buried, remains a place of pilgrimage, and numerous institutions, schools, and organizations throughout the world bear his name.