Interstate Vision
Headed toward Indianapolis See exit for Ronald Reagan Parkway I think of 1980s See a small mountain Of Central American corpses Women & children & men The slaughtered The disappeared At the hands of contras,…
Category: Latin America
How Father Ignacio Ellacuría Saw Us
In regard to the ideal of the dominant old human being in the so-called North Atlantic and Western Christian civilization, certain features have to be rejected. These include its radical insecurity which leads it to…
Remembering the Salvadoran Martyrs Reading Group
Dear Friends, We have been turning over in our minds the following reflection from an interview with U.S. linguist and activist Noam Chomsky (1996): Closer to the explanation is your observation that they [Eastern European…
Share the Wealth: “Quiero ver” (Let me see), with Ale Vazquez
“There are many things that can only be seen through eyes that have cried.” Oscar A. Romero I will be reflecting on a semester in El Salvador during which I learned how to love others…
Scintillating Promises (The Joys of Reading and Writing/Reinaldo Arenas)
Reading Reinaldo Areas’ novel The Color of Summer was a breakthrough experience for me. From him (and Eduardo Galeano) I figured out how to structure what eventually became The Book of Mev. The following are some passages I love from his Before…
“On Taking Sides” by Bishop Pedro Casaldáliga
We had now made a clean break with the fazendas. We could no longer celebrate the Eucharist under the shelter of these lords of the earth. No more traveling in their cars or airplanes, no more…
Share the Wealth: A Summer in Nicaragua, with Annelise Feder and Erin Twiehaus
Our next Share the Wealth will be this Saturday evening. Join us as we hear stories of accompaniment in Nicaragua from SLU undergrads Annelise Feder and Erin Twiehaus. They will share their experiences this past…
Would You Say Something About Old Age by Nicanor Parra
WOULD YOU SAY SOMETHING ABOUT OLD AGE His students once asked Of Dr. Bertrand Russell & the venerable elder replied: Old age… A time like any other For fighting for a cause that’s just –Chliean…
A Doctor and a Child: Christmas Eve in Managua
Fernando Silva ran the children’s hospital in Managua. On Christmas Eve, he worked late into the night. Firecrackers were exploding and fireworks lit up the sky when Fernando decided it was time to leave. They…
Contemporaries
“Who are my contemporaries?” Juan Gelman asks himself. Juan says that sometimes he comes across [people] who smell of fear, in Buenos Aires, Paris, or anywhere in the world, and feels that these [people] are…