"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".