Archbishop Oscar Romero - utterly radical & utterly orthodox. A Saint for the 21stC ?
(To start the Romero week).

Julian Filochowski & Michael Campbell Johnson SJ

17th March 2012

Bishop and martyr, Oscar Romero was assassinated as he celebrated mass on March 24 1980. In a land of lies and cover-up, he had fearlessly spoken the unvarnished truth of the brutal repression suffered by his people. Today he is an attractive model of a Christian and a fascinating churchman for our 21st century world. He was an ordinary priest, the very best of his vintage, who yet did quite extraordinary things. He embodied that elusive option for the poor in his life and in his episcopal ministry - and in the end he gave his life in the same unrelenting commitment to the poor.

The workshop will enable people to get to know and better understand Archbishop Romero; to learn about his life and martyrdom, his struggles and contradictions, his profound spirituality and love of God combined with his tireless pursuit of justice for the poor.

Besides talks and discussion, the workshop will include the showing of a still-unreleased 2010 film "Monseñor: the Last Journey of Oscar Romero". The workshop will also look at the rocky road that has been the Servant of God's path to beatification, notwithstanding the great acclaim he has received and the esteem in which he is held both within and far beyond the Church.

The workshop will conclude with a short Service of Prayer and Readings.

About the Facilitators

Julian Filochowski studied Economics at Churchill College, Cambridge. On graduation he became Coordinator of the British Volunteer Programme in Central America. In 1973 he joined CIIR in London. For nine years he campaigned on human rights and development issues linked to Latin America and worked with Archbishop Oscar Romero. From1982 to 2003 Julian was Director of CAFOD, the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development. He is a founder trustee and Chair of the Archbishop Romero Trust. He is also a director of the Tablet Publishing Company. He currently works as advocacy and strategic development advisor at Jesuit Missions.

In his long life as a Jesuit and a priest, Michael Campbell-Johnston, known to all as CJ, has ben committed to putting the social teaching of the Catholic Church into practice. His initial interest led him in the 1950s to study economics at the LSE, when such a move for a Jesuit in Britain was almost unheard of. Ten years later he had completed his theological studies in Mexico, and was already establishing a ministry promoting human rights in the newly dependent former colony of Guyana.

From there he was appointed to Rome to work with the widely and highly esteemed Superior General of the Society of Jesus, Fr Pedro Arrupe, who embodied the Society's commitment to a faith that does justice and to the Church's preferential option for the poor. CJ gave reality to Fr Arrupe's dream for a refugee service to offer assistance to some of the world's neediest people, and in 1981 the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) was born, an organization now commonly regarded as one of the world's leading refugee support networks. CJ himself served with the JRS in war-torn El Salvador in the years immediately following the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero.

CJ says "When I returned to El Salvador after Romero's martyrdom and was deeply impressed by the enormous affect this had had on most people. So I began studying his life and speakling and wrriting about him. This is why I was invited to give the public address on his life at Westminster Abbey in 1998.

See a recent article CJ has written on Romero on Thinking Faith http://www.thinkingfaith.org/articles/20110323_1.htm

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