Tuesday 9 December 2014

Madre de los Decaparecidos: Mother of God, Mother of the Tortured







Today, the US Senate releases its report into the CIA's torture of detainees after the events of 11 September 2001.

Some rejoice when truth is made known; some tremble with anger or fear. The message of the Gospel of Jesus is: which side are you on?

In this icon, The Blessed Virgin Mary is the 'Mother of the Disappeared'.

She wears the white scarf of the Argentine mothers who stood for years in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, demanding to know what happened to their loved 
ones who were arrested, tortured, and killed, holding banners demanding 'Donde estan?' ('where are they?'). 

She holds the crown of thorns that remind us that she is the mother of a son arrested, denied justice, and tortured to death in public. 

The 'white hand' of the death squads of Central America defaces the icon. 

Jesus and his mother were- and are- every victim of injustice, torture, and death, every victim of power and money.

They are in our prisons, in Guantanamo, in our 'black spots'...

What we do the least of these, we do to him... and to her...

Lord Jesus Christ, tortured and murdered, have mercy on us and give us courage to speak and act. 

Holy Mary, Mother of God, Mother of the Tortured, pray for us.

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