With his hope placed in Jesus Christ and a longing to see his homeland free one day, a Nicaraguan priest carries out his ministry in Costa Rica, the country to which he came after being forced to flee due to the Nicaraguan government’s persecution against the Catholic Church.
“It‘s been 30 months since I had to flee,” the priest told ACI Prensa, the Spanish-language sister service of EWTN News. He asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals against his family living in Nicaragua.
Although he currently carries out his ministry in a Costa Rican parish, he acknowledges that each day is tinged with nostalgia for the land he left behind.
He fled early one morning in 2024 after the authorities had issued an arrest warrant for him. He left Nicaragua without even being able to say goodbye to his family.
“I left Nicaragua without seeing my mother, without telling her: ‘Mom, I’m leaving.’ I couldn’t say goodbye to anyone; that hurts,” he said sadly.
The persecution began in 2018
The “harassment” against him, as he himself describes it, began in 2018 when street protests against President Daniel Ortega’s government erupted. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the crackdown left hundreds dead and injured.
At that time, he was providing pastoral support to youth groups, which led to his involvement. “I supported the young people in the sense of praying for them and, secondly, by looking for food and medicine for university students and the general population whenever they were mistreated, subjected to violence, or beaten.”
He also began preaching about human dignity and social justice during his Masses. He sought “to call for respect and for the freedom of a people crying out for justice and demanding their rights to be valued.”
“That bothered the government; it made them angry,” he lamented.
As the months went by, he began receiving calls and messages on his personal number. He also stated: “Armed military personnel would arrive and enter the church to record the homilies; in short, I felt constantly watched.”
The priest recounted that in late 2023 he was forced to leave his community and go into hiding. “I spent New Year’s on the run, in hiding.” Finally, in January 2024, an arrest warrant was issued for him, and he decided to flee to Costa Rica.
“I had to leave almost at midnight, trying to save my life. I practically had to flee for no reason at all because I hadn’t committed any crime,” he stated.
His case is not an isolated one. He is among the multitude of the faithful suffering the systematic persecution that the Ortega dictatorship has waged against the Catholic Church. Since 2018, more than 1,030 attacks against Catholics have been documented, and over a hundred priests and four bishops have been expelled or forced into exile.
New opportunities in Costa Rica
“The tears were flowing,” the priest recalled, thinking back to the moment he crossed the border and left his country behind. More than two years after that event, he said that “to this day, I feel a longing for the people I love.”
Despite the pain, he said he has found a new opportunity in Costa Rica, thanks to the support received from the country’s bishops and various priests, who “have given me shelter and stability.
That support enabled him to rebuild his life and resume his priestly ministry. Convinced that God does not abandon those who suffer, he affirmed: “Jesus is with me, and Most Holy Mary, my beautiful, beloved Mother, does not forsake me.”
He said he asks God every day to “free Nicaragua from that cruel, indolent, murderous regime.”
“I ask for justice, I ask for peace, I ask the Lord to grant me the grace to return to my beautiful land, to be able to see my mother.”
Migrant priests: A gift for the Church in Costa Rica
Currently, there are around 25 Nicaraguan priests living in Costa Rica, Father Gustavo Meneses, executive secretary of the National Human Mobility Commission of the Costa Rican Bishops’ Conference, told ACI Prensa.
Far from considering them a burden, Meneses maintains that they represent “a gift from God among us,” as they have come to “meet needs within our dioceses,” especially those with fewer priests.
Recently, a private meeting was held that, Meneses explained, was “an opportunity for them to meet, to get to know each other. Because they themselves are beginning to realize who’s here.”
The priest indicated that many shared the pain of having left their families, “but, above all, it hurts them to have abandoned their pastoral mission.”
He thus considers that one of the challenges for the Catholic Church in Costa Rica is to offer them the human and psychological support that enables them to heal from the effects of exile.
He also called on the authorities to expedite international protection processes and prevent those fleeing persecution from remaining for long periods in a “legal limbo” that exposes them to deportation.
This story was first published by ACI Prensa, the Spanish-language sister service of EWTN News. It has been translated and adapted by EWTN News English.
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