Another Nicaraguan bishop remains missing after being apprehended by police, drawing a rebuke from the United States for the ongoing “attacks on religious freedom” in the increasingly authoritarian country. Source: OSV News.
Bishop Juan Abelardo Mata was detained by police on June 29 – one day after celebrating a Mass in the city of Estelí, during which he requested prayers for the country’s persecuted Catholic Church, according to independent Nicaraguan news outlet Confidencial.
The country’s interior ministry acknowledged Bishop Mata had been detained, but said in a July 4 statement that he “has returned to his home, where he remains in perfect condition”.
The statement continued, “Mr Abelardo Mata has given statements regarding various episodes of violation of national laws, which the Nicaraguan people have known about at different times.”
Confidencial and Catholic observers, however, said Bishop Mata’s whereabouts remains unknown.
“Until the dictatorship does not present the emeritus bishop Juan Abelardo Mata safe and sound at his home, any statement they issue is a lie,” Martha Patricia Molina, an exiled lawyer who tracks Nicaraguan Church repression, said in a July 4 X post.
“The bishop IS NOT AT HIS HOME. The priests who are informed about the case have confirmed this to me.”
Ms Molina said on July 6 that no one close to Bishop Mata has seen him, despite the interior ministry’s claims.
She told Confidencial that Fr Francisco Morales, pastor of the parish where Bishop Mata celebrated Mass prior to his detention, was also detained. His whereabouts also remain unknown.
The Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs in the United States’ Department of State said in a July 4 post on X: “We demand the immediate and unconditional release of Nicaraguan Bishop Abelardo Mata who has been arbitrarily detained by the Murillo-Ortega dictatorship. 80-year old Bishop Mata poses no threat to the regime and his health is fragile. We further condemn the Murillo-Ortega dictatorship’s continued cruel religious persecution and repression.”
The detention of Bishop Mata is another example of the repression of Nicaragua’s Catholic Church under the Sandinista regime of co-presidents Daniel Ortega and his wife, Rosario Murillo.
The repression has forced priests to censor their homilies, parishes to keep processions to Church property and clergy to flee the country. Ms Molina has counted more than 300 priests, religious and seminarians in exile, along with four bishops.
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US condemns detention of Nicaraguan bishop as Church awaits proof of his safety (By David Agren, OSV News)
