St. Oscar Romero
Feast 03-24 · Canonized 2018
Patron of
About
Oscar Romero was born in 1917 in El Salvador and ordained a priest in 1942. Known as a quiet, bookish churchman, he was appointed Archbishop of San Salvador in 1977, a time of escalating violence and repression against the poor.
Within weeks of his appointment, his friend Fr. Rutilio Grande was murdered for defending campesinos. The killing transformed Romero, who became a fearless voice for the oppressed, denouncing violence from all sides in his Sunday homilies, broadcast across the country.
On March 24, 1980, he was shot dead while celebrating Mass in a hospital chapel. His funeral was attacked, and the civil war that followed claimed some 75,000 lives. Beatified in 2015 and canonized by Pope Francis in 2018, he is venerated as a martyr and patron of the poor and oppressed.
Suggested prayer
O God, who gave St. Oscar Romero courage to denounce violence from all sides and to die at the altar for the poor, grant through his intercession that the oppressed may be defended and that all who speak truth to power may not be silenced. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.
