March for Romero

There are many examples to justify Oberlin's credo that one person can change the world. Junior Claire Miller was able to take part in a celebration of one such person when she traveled to El Salvador to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the assassination of Bishop Oscar Romero. It is believed he was killed because of his involvement in human rights activism.

"Romero's assassination had happened exactly 20 years ago," said Miller. She protested with thousands of Salvadorans. "There were marches with huge masses of people, and speeches," said Miller. "We got to meet a lot of interesting characters."

Romero was appointed Archbishop of El Salvador in 1977. Miller's mother, Ariel, said, "One of the key factors in the political instability of the 1970s and 80s was the great concentration of wealth in a few hands. Those who spoke out for the disenfranchised started a guerilla movement and the right struck back with death squads and wholesale military attacks on civilians."

In the late '70s, the Catholic Church in Central America was torn by two contrasting ideologies: those priests who wanted to maintain a stabilizing presence of non-confrontation in politics and those who believed it was their duty to speak out against the injustice they perceived as being perpetrated by the Salvadoran state. Romero was chosen because he was believed to be a moderate with whom all could agree.

"He'd been hired by the Church because they thought he was this really quiet, really conservative candidate with no threat of being a rebel whatsoever. When he actually became Archbishop, he took a look around him and realized what the situation with the people was, and started fighting for them in whatever way he could," said Miller.

Soon after becoming the Archbishop, a close friend of Romero's was murdered by a paramilitary death squad. His friend's death prompted Romero to become a fierce advocate for the Salvadoran masses. Never before had a high-ranking member of the Church taken such a bold stance.

The Salvadoran government took note of Romero's activism, and on March 24, 1980, as Romero was performing mass, he was killed by a shot in the chest that came from the back of the building. His murder turned him into a martyr for the Salvadoran people.

"He was really inspirational to them. He was like the Martin Luther King of Central America," said Miller.

"His funeral march had been similarly immense. The army started shooting at people at his funeral from the top of a building. The crowd rushed the church, and people were killed by the shooting and the crush of the crowd," said Miller. "We ended up in the same place [where it happened], and people were shooting off firecrackers. It was really sinister, because they made the same sound. Sounds like gunfire can't be that reassuring to people that have grown up in El Salvador."

Miller went to El Salvador with her parents, who are members of Crispaz, an organization dedicated to educating U.S. citizens about the political and economic situation in the country. She was able to participate in the protest marches that eulogized Romero. "There was a big mass at the hospital [parish] where he was assassinated. The marchers started from there and then went to the center of San Salvador, which is the capital city. There were all of these people, and they were all happy and really looking to fulfill [Romero's] promise. It wasn't just some commemorative march. All of the slogans we were shouting were things like 'se ve, se siente, Romero esta presente,' which means 'it's seen, it's felt, Romero is present still," said Miller.

"We went to the center of the city which is really poor, and people were lined up everywhere to see these marches go by. There were these streams of light, and a huge picture of Romero that was about 20feet high. It was beautiful," said Miller.

Although a peace agreement between the guerilla forces and the Salvadoran government was signed in 1992, it marks a dark period of U.S. history. In 1980, reports of a civilian massacre by the Salvadoran military in the village of El Mozote reached the American newspapers, but the Reagan administration denied that there was evidence that the massacre had taken place. The Democratic Congress, although they had originally denounced the documented human rights abuses of the Salvadoran regime, in the end accepted the Reagan administration's assertion that El Salvador was making a significant effort to comply with international human rights laws. "The U.S. continued to give aid to the [Salvadorian] government, contributing to the human rights abuses," said Miller.

"We met several Salvadorians and foreign volunteers (including Americans) who are doing important small-scale development projects," said Ariel Miller. "Many of the people who carry on this difficult work are motivated by a strong communal and joyous religious faith that affirms the value and dignity of every person, no matter how impoverished or afflicted. This is totally in the spirit of Romero."