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“The hope that our Church encourages,” said Romero, “is neither naïve nor passive. It is rather a summons from the word of God for the great majority of the people, the poor, that they assume their proper responsibility.… And it is support, sometimes critical support, for their just causes and demands. The hope that we preach to the poor is intended to give them back their dignity, to encourage them to take charge of their own future.”

Oscar Romero reminds us: “The face of Christ is among the sacks and baskets of the farmworker; the face of Christ is among those who are tortured and mistreated in the prisons; the face of Christ is dying of hunger in the children who have nothing to eat; the face of Christ is in the poor who ask the church for their voice to be heard. How can the church deny this request when it is Christ who is telling us to speak for him.”

A revolution motivated by the power of love instead of arms, a revolution that seeks not the overthrow but the conversion of society: This became Romero’s focus during his final three years as archbishop of San Salvador. For the ruling elite, conversion meant the softening of their stony hearts and an embrace of the biblical truth that all people are equally beloved by God and equally deserving of the world’s resources.