2023-07-05 02:45:00
July 4, 2023 / 7:45 p.m.
In a new attack against the Catholic Church, the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua canceled the legal status and confiscated the assets of a congregation of nuns, whose convent the police entered over the weekend to expel them.
The regime, through the Ministry of the Interior, took the measure this Tuesday, July 4, on the Fundación Fraternidad Pobres de Jesucristo, according to the Nicaraguan media. Article 66.
The argument used for said decision is that the congregation “failed to comply with its obligations” by not reporting its latest financial statements and having the board of directors “defeated” since February 2021.
The ministry indicated that it is now up to the Attorney General’s Office to transfer the assets of the congregation, including the convent, to the name of the State.
“The measure adopted against the nuns is arbitrary and now they add the confiscation of their real estate,” lamented Martha Patricia Molina, researcher and author of the report “Nicaragua, a Persecuted Church?”
In statements to ACI Prensa, Molina recalled that “the Political Constitution of Nicaragua prohibits confiscation, but it has already become a common practice under the dictatorship, just like in the 1980s.”
On the night of July 2, the police broke into the convent of the nuns, who were finally expelled. The sisters headed to El Salvador, where they will continue their mission of serving those most in need.
The Sisters of the Poor Fraternity of Jesus Christ arrived in Nicaragua in 2016 from Brazil, where they were founded by the priest Gilson Sobreiro. They are also present in countries like Costa Rica, Guatemala and El Salvador.
This new attack by the Ortega dictatorship against nuns occurs one year after the expulsion of a group of Missionaries of Charity, the congregation founded by Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who were later welcomed in the Diocese of Tilarán-Liberia, in Costa Rica.
Walter Sánchez Silva is a senior writer at ACI Prensa, with more than 15 years covering Church events in Europe, America and Asia.
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