“[The Church] is a community of
faith whose primary obligation, whose raison d’etre, is to continue the life
and work of Jesus.” (73) No lesser objective
would inspire such a pairing of powerful intellect and complete sacrifice as that
of Archbishop Oscar Romero. The
centrality of evangelism and justice, especially with regards to the violence
and poverty in his “beloved country”, was clearly motivated by no alternative
ideology. No ideology encompassed
Jesus. Marxism and Capitalism simply had
fallen off different sides of the same horse.
The direction that the church must take cannot be left to the decision of
councils or national politics. “Only in
the light of Christ, of his actions and his teaching, can the church find
meaning of, and guidance for, its service in the world.” (71) For Romero, the action and teaching was
clear. “I tell you the truth,” Jesus said, “Whatever you do for one of the
least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” (Matthew 25:40) Every individual or ideology that stood in
the way of justice must be confronted—confronted by what Romero would
repeatedly call, “the full power of the Gospel.” Romero understood that the advance of the
church was not done by matching violence with violence. The church advances through
evangelism—“Evangelism is in fact the grace and vocation proper to the Church,
its deepest identity.” (130) Violence
will only lead to a different form of bondage; evangelism leads to true
liberation. Romero was very clear that
his emphasis on the poor was not because they were extra special. All people equally need Jesus. Romero, following the pattern of Jesus,
focused on the poor because they are the one without voices, overwhelmed by
rampant injustice. By doing so he became
the “voice for the voiceless.”
Evangelism and justice cannot be
merely fashionable hobbies of the modern church. They are not niceties and things that we do
to booster the identity of our organizations.
The Gospel is not a brand to be marketed; it is a power that is waiting
to be unleashed. It is very clear in the
writings of Romero that he believed the Gospel was more powerful than steel and
gun powder. Guns will not triumph, but
the person of faith will. This is not a
new conviction, but an old tradition.
The commitment to sacrificial evangelism and fearless pursuit of justice
has won the greatest victories in all the annals of history. Though it is currently trendy to speak of “relevant”
evangelism and justice in modern culture it rarely takes a selfless,
sacrificial form. Romero aptly remarked,
“Just as injustice takes concrete forms, so the promotion of justice must take
concrete forms.” (75) The form of injustice
was apparent in El Salvador—abductions, assassinations, wide-spread poverty,
inequality—and required an equally visible response. This is culturally awkward, though. It is not neutral and will force us away from
the center of normalcy. For example: we
decry racism, but are too busy to make an effort to extend a hand of
reconciliation. But our words are so
beautiful! Nice sermons and chili
cook-offs will not further the kingdom unless they take the form of true and
visible justice and mercy. The poor are
not helped by people feeling bad, they are helped by people taking acting on
their behalf. “Your attitude should be
the same as that of Christ Jesus: who, being in very nature God, did not
consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing,
taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he
humbled himself to death—even death on a cross!” (Philippians 2:5-8)
