First Stop: The Capital City

So, when we got to El Salvador, our first order of business was to get acquainted with the big city, in which we'd be living for our four weeks here. This picture is the inside of the Cathedral in downtown San Salvador. Pretty groovy take on stained glass, no?

We visited the home and workplace of a man named Oscar Romero. This man was the archbishop of El Salvador in the seventies, before which he was very conservative
and completely supported the crony capitalist exploitation of the masses. However, during his time as archbishop, he began to recognize the significance of the people, and so he dedicated his life to offering a voice to the poor and repressed. This practice is known in El Salvador
as Liberation Theology. Shortly after his transformation, he was assassinated by
the government along with several other religious social advocates. Around this time, the twelve-year long civil war was going on. This mural is in memory of these events.

After Romero's death, six other liberationists priests who lived and worked
to actualize his mission were also brutally murdered by the government outside their
shared home. Their bodies were left on display on their front lawn, with brain matter
and other innards exposed as a threat to other revolutionary thinkers that liberationist
ideas should die with these men. The remains of their brains are in these jars, preserved with the memory and continuation of their work, along with the clothing they were wearing when they died.

Inside the chapel at the Romero center, where these six men were murdered,
there exists the objective never to forget or ignore the suffering of the people at the hands of oppression. Furthermore, there exists the objective never to allow anyone to forget that suffering until it no longer exists.

In order to achieve this goal, the chapel has posted images of suffering on its walls based on historical accounts of violence. Why is this a big deal? Because I have never, ever in my life seen
Catholicism even attempt to look the harsh reality in the eye. It's graphic, and it's hard to see - but at least it's true.