Nicaraguan Catholic Bishop Rolando Alvarez speaks to the press on the Santo Cristo de Esquipulas church in Managua, on Could 20, 2022.

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AFP by way of Getty Photos

Nicaraguan Catholic Bishop Rolando Alvarez speaks to the press on the Santo Cristo de Esquipulas church in Managua, on Could 20, 2022.

AFP by way of Getty Photos

Roman Catholic Bishop Rolando Alvarez of Matagalpa, Nicaragua, is in jail this week. He could also be there for 26 years.

Bishop Alvarez has protested towards the regime of President Daniel Ortega, and was sentenced for what a Nicaraguan court docket known as treason and “undermining nationwide integrity.”

The bishop was sentenced simply days after he was solely steps away from becoming a member of a bunch of 222 political prisoners the federal government launched final week to be flown to the USA. However he stopped on the plane’s stairs.

“Let the others be free,” Bishop Alvarez declared. “I’ll endure their punishment.”

Secretary of State Antony Blinken known as the discharge, “a constructive step in direction of addressing human rights abuses within the nation …” However extra political prisoners stay in Nicaragua. And this week the regime revoked the citizenship of 94 political opponents, calling them “traitors” too.

Bishop Alvarez grew to become a goal for presidency prosecution final yr when he criticized President Ortega’s regime for jailing monks and seminarians, exiling an archbishop and 18 sisters of the Missionaries of Charity, and shutting church radio stations.

Safety forces surrounded his personal church in Matagalpa. The Bishop got here out and informed them he can be, “Frightened and on my knees, solely earlier than God.” He was positioned beneath home arrest.

President Ortega known as the bishop’s refusal to board the airplane out of Nicaragua, “an absurd factor.” And from our safe perch in a society wherein folks can converse, vote, and for that matter, boo the president of the USA to his face throughout an tackle earlier than Congress, we’d surprise: why did not Bishop Alvarez simply get on that airplane and go?

Some 180,000 Nicaraguans crossed into the USA within the first 11 months of final yr; 1000’s extra nonetheless wait. Bishop Alvarez wouldn’t solely be safer and extra snug within the U.S., however free to talk and be heard all over the world.

However Fr. James Martin, the Jesuit priest, and editor-at-large of America journal informed us this week that security, consolation, and freedom for himself does not appear to be how Bishop Rolando Alvarez sees the aim of his priesthood, and his life.

“Bishop Alvarez may be very a lot in keeping with the actions of many saints and martyrs of the church,” Fr. Martin informed us. “This sort of holiness is about remaining with your pals and refusing to depart them.”