The conscience of Monsignor Rolando Álvarez will not be calm as long as he knows that there are Nicaraguans imprisoned and suffering martyrdom, says researcher and jurist Martha Molina. 
By: Intertextual/ Voces en Libertad/ contacto@intertextualcr.com
Once again, Monsignor Rolando Álvarez, the Bishop of Matagalpa and political prisoner of the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, challenges the regime and its repressive methods and does not accept exile. He stayed in Nicaragua.nnThe first time that the religious leader challenged the regime was on February 9, 2023, when Ortega banished 222 political prisoners to the United States, but the leader did not leave the country because it was his right to stay. As punishment, the dictator ordered an express trial and a sentence of 26 years and four months in prison, which he is serving in La Modelo prison.
The Nicaraguan researcher and lawyer Martha Patricia Molina, said in this regard that Monsignor Álvarez with his decision makes it clear that «he is not a man who complies with the whims and arbitrariness of anyone, least of all the dictatorship.» “The Bishop has made it clear that his conscience will not be clear as long as he knows that there are many Nicaraguans imprisoned and suffering martyrdom,” Molina said.
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“As long as Pope Francis does not order him to leave, he will not leave and his attitude is too dangerous because Mrs. Rosario Murillo is a temperamental woman and at any moment she can give the order to assassinate him, like in 2018, when she gave the order of ‘let’s go with everything’. Mrs. Rosario Murillo knows that nothing happens if she murders, she has already ordered the murder of more than 300 Nicaraguans and she knows that there are no effects against this criminal action,” the lawyer also warned.
“Enormous sacrifice” by Monsignor Rolando Álvarez
Meanwhile, Nicaraguan journalist Israel Espinoza González expressed that Monsignor Álvarez “knows that his example is a sign of peaceful, civic and non-violent resistance against a blasphemous, cruel, anti-Christian and inhuman authoritarian power.”
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For Espinoza González, Monsignor Álvarez’s refusal to leave Nicaragua indicates «his sense of sacrifice, love of neighbor and his citizen commitment to Nicaragua, it is also an enormous sacrifice.» “Monsignor Álvarez knows that although all the unjustly imprisoned priests have been released, Ortega’s attacks on the church can continue. He also knows that while he is in jail he is a thorn in the side of the regime because he is the political prisoner with the greatest national weight and international relevance, and in this way he can help,” he said.
