August 15th would have been Monseñor Oscar Romero's 95th birthday. Hermano Juancito has some reflections on this remarkable man who remains an inspiration to so many in El Salvador and around the world.
When he was killed at the altar on March 24, 1980, he was a strong advocate of the poor and critic of the repression he saw around him in El Salvador. But he was not always that way.
Many people talk about a conversion of Archbishop Romero after his friend, the Jesuit priest Rutilio Grande, was killed in March 1977. It is very true that that event sparked something within him and opened his heart to be more outspoken in the face of injustice and killing.
But I don’t think it was a road to Damascus experience, where – in one random moment – Monseñor Romero changed.
I think it is more a case of a long conversion where he let himself be opened more to God.
