"To change the culture of power for the power of culture": this is how
we can summarize the message of the Auxiliary Bishop of Managua, Silvio
José Báez Ortega, in his speech at the Human Rights Forum, held this
week in Managua and organized by the Asociación Nicaragüense Pro
Derechos Humanos (ANPDH).
For Bishop Báez, "the warlords, political
patronage, corruption, electoral fraud are the culture of power; we have
such a distorted culture of power in Nicaragua and of which we are
heirs".
The Auxiliary Bishop of Managua was invited to present the theme "Power
in the Bible" during which he said: "The culture of power has to be
replaced with the power of culture: the primacy of the human being, of
reason, the ability to understand through dialogue; it is urgent to
restore the core values to reconstruct the social fabric, which is
damaged and broken".
Mgr. Silvio Baez recalled that Jesus Christ never negotiated truth or
dignity: "I always say that Jesus, if he had agreed with Herod and
Pilate, he would not have ended up on the cross; if he had agreed with
the chief priests of the temple to divide the gain of religion, he would
not have ended up on the cross. He never came to terms, he never gave
up what he considered essential: the value of the human person".