#bishop-silvio-jose-baez — Public Fediverse posts

Quote of the day, 11 May: Silvio José Báez, ocd

Jesus invites us to trust in God and in him. To believe means to trust, first of all—to surrender, to abandon ourselves to love. In the face of fear, the antidote par excellence is trust in God.

Faced with the tragedy of his crucifixion, Jesus asks us to do the same today as asked his disciples then. He wants us to persevere each day, united to him and the Father, with the awareness that we are loved and cared for with a love so profound, it surpasses understanding.

We won’t always be able to comprehend the bad things that happen to us, but we always will be able to trust in the love of God who cares for us, consoles and sustains us.

Bishop Silvio José Báez, o.c.d.

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua
10 May 2020

Translation from the Spanish text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: An image of prayer, dialogue, listening, and trust. Image credit: Lyndon Stratford / Adobe Stock.

Not a Time for Silence — Silvio José Báez, ocd

Today’s Gospel recounts the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. It tells us when he began to preach and what his first message was.

“When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee … From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, ‘Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven has come near’” (Mt 4:12, 17).

Jesus had been an enthusiastic supporter of the Baptist’s movement—probably even his disciple—and he himself was baptized by John. John’s arrest must have deeply affected Jesus. Yet instead of intimidating him, this act of injustice helped him understand that God’s work had to continue.

People can be silenced, but great ideals endure. They extinguished the voice crying out in the desert, but a stronger voice arose—the voice of Jesus. Even when a prophet is silenced, God’s voice will always be heard, for “the word of God is not chained” (2 Tim 2:9). Jesus knew how to read the signs of the times. After John’s arrest, he could have withdrawn into hiding and lived an ordinary life. Instead, he chose to keep preaching in God’s name, nourishing his people’s hope and proclaiming God’s saving plan with passion.

Jesus teaches us that when everything seems to come to a halt, it’s the perfect moment to recalibrate our inner compass, to be docile to God’s ways, to look to the future with hope, and to keep moving forward. Problems and obstacles can become opportunities to discover strengths we didn’t know we had. When we face challenges without letting discouragement break us, we grow stronger and find creative solutions. The Lord’s strength and love are present in every difficulty we face. Let’s learn to see life with the eyes of Jesus, who knew how to discover new paths when everything seemed to be over.

We must stay attentive to what’s happening around us. We’re living in a decisive moment, one in which global geopolitics seem to be reshaped through the use of force, the denial of law, and contempt and mistreatment toward the most vulnerable people. We also see how economic relations and wealth have been elevated into a power that governs the world, forgetting the value and dignity of persons and nations. It’s time to redirect the course of history. It’s time to believe again in reason, peaceful understanding, human dignity, and in the urgent pursuit of peace and fraternity. As Pope Leo said at the Mass inaugurating his pontificate on May 18, 2025: “This is the hour of love!” It’s the hour to believe in God’s transforming power and in humanity’s ability to build a better world.

In many of our countries, we’re living through times of uncertainty and painful experiences of arbitrary powers that threaten, repress, and imprison. This isn’t the hour to remain silent or to lose heart. Like Jesus, who pressed forward after John’s arrest, we too must stand firm and continue to dream—and to fight for the liberation and democratization of our people, now at hand.

For the Church, this isn’t a time for silence. It’s time to raise our voices: to cast light into the darkness of this present hour, to nourish the people’s hope, and to denounce oppressive structures that have long prevailed but are now on the verge of disappearing.

This is the moment for political leaders not only to address international bodies or the media, but to speak directly to the people—with wisdom and solidarity. The time has come to give the people within the country a central role: to listen to their needs and concerns, to accompany their efforts to organize, and to strengthen their hope. Paraphrasing what Pope Francis said in Bolivia in 2015, we must remember that the future of our people doesn’t lie only in the hands of great powers or political leaders. It lies, above all, in the hands of the people themselves and in their ability to organize (Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Bolivia, July 9, 2015).

Today’s Gospel also shows us what lay at the heart of Jesus’ preaching. He left the desert and went to Galilee, a region full of villages and cities. And there, in the midst of the people, he began to proclaim: “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven has come near” (Mt 4:17). In these few words we find a summary of everything Jesus preached. The time of distance from God is over. The Kingdom of Heaven is near. God has drawn close with all his saving power. We’re not alone, weighed down and entangled in our problems, weaknesses, and sufferings.

When Jesus announces the nearness of the Kingdom of Heaven, he adds: “Repent” (Mt 4:17). He invites us to examine how we think and how we act, and to let go of everything that keeps us from living fully.

• To repent is to remove the obstacles that block God’s closeness.
• To repent is to allow ourselves to be transformed by the renewing power of God’s love.
• It means abandoning the logic of selfishness and embracing the logic of love and respect for others, which is God’s very essence.
• It’s a call to go beyond personal interests and self-satisfaction and to build relationships rooted in compassion and solidarity—the foundations of a new humanity.

With Jesus, the Kingdom of Heaven has drawn near. God is among us. We’re not meant to live enslaved by our sins or trapped in a dark and meaningless life. We can be freed from the evil that dominates us and experience the joy of God’s forgiveness. We can live as God’s beloved children, welcoming his will and entrusting ourselves confidently to him. And we can become true brothers and sisters, letting go of a competitive way of seeing life and building together societies that are just and peaceful.

The new world that God’s closeness brings into being may seem like a dream, but God is already making it real. He’s waiting for us to welcome his love, to trust in him, and to be willing to remove the obstacles that keep him at a distance. Let’s receive with renewed joy Jesus’ great proclamation today: “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven has come.”

Bishop Silvio José Báez, o.c.d.

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua
Homily for the Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, 25 January 2026

Translation from the Spanish text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Christ’s teaching ministry is featured in this stained glass window from Canterbury Cathedral. Image credit: Lawrence Lew, OP / Flickr (Some rights reserved).

#BishopSilvioJoséBáez #hope #humanDignity #injustice #propheticMinistry

The Journey Is the Cure — Silvio José Báez, ocd

“Now as they were going away they were cleansed.”
— Luke 17:14

In this Sunday’s Gospel (Lk 17:11-19), we heard that as Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem, entering a village, “ten men suffering from a virulent skin-disease came to meet him. They stood some way off and called to him, ‘Jesus! Master! Take pity on us!’” (Lk 17:12-13).

As we know, lepers were people whom the Law of Moses prohibited from coming into contact with others. They lived excluded from social life and from worship. They had to dwell on the outskirts of the city, hopeless and alone. They were like the living dead. Today the physical disease of leprosy has been almost totally eliminated, but unfortunately our world suffers from other forms of leprosy. Authoritarian systems and the powerful create new lepers. Today’s social leprosies divide humanity by excluding or subjugating the weakest, exploiting the poor, mistreating and expelling migrants, or silencing those who think differently or speak truths that challenge such systems.

The Cry of the Excluded

The lepers in the Gospel see Jesus from afar and cry out to him: “Jesus! Master! Take pity on us!” (Lk 17:13). It is a brief, heart-wrenching cry that springs from the depths of human suffering. Those poor men, disfigured in their bodies, still have eyes to see and a voice to cry out. They are an icon of authentic faith. Although they do not physically approach Jesus, with their eyes and their voices they enter into relationship with him, the only one who can free them from isolation and pain—from the humiliation of being excluded. We are believers when we have eyes to see Jesus as a gateway to hope, and when we have a voice to cry out to him from our suffering.

Cultivate Resistance

The ten lepers in the Gospel not only trust Jesus; they also resist a system that excludes them and a religion that ignores them. They refuse to resign themselves to living as outcasts, dwelling on their own pain and watching their lives fade away in suffering and solitude. Today such resistance is necessary.

In the face of oppressive systems and criminal regimes that subjugate peoples, we must cultivate:

• Spiritual resistance to free ourselves from pessimism
• Intellectual resistance to continue thinking freely
• Moral resistance to continue denouncing injustice
• Faithful resistance to keep trusting in the God of life and liberation

There are historical stages when the future of peoples is uncertain, when social weariness sets in, when attempts fail and disappointments mount. These are not failures—they are the birth pangs of a new society. In those moments we must not fall into discouragement. Following the example of today’s lepers, we must preserve our spirit of resistance so as not to become accustomed to the forced normality that the oppressor wants to impose, and so as not to lose the capacity to dream of a just and free society.

Healing on the Way

Jesus does not approach the lepers, but he knows that God wants them whole and does not want them to suffer even one more second. Therefore, he immediately asks them to go present themselves to the priests of the temple, so the priests can verify their healing and the lepers can reintegrate into their homes and their people (cf. Lk 17:14). Still sick, still covered with leprosy, those men set out on the road, fulfilling Jesus’ command without delay and with complete trust. Surprisingly, the Gospel says that “as they were going away they were cleansed” (Lk 17:14).

The lepers were not cured while standing in front of Jesus, but afterward, when trusting in his word they set out on the road. In reality they were already healed the moment they encountered Jesus, though they could not yet see it or know it. They simply trusted and did not hesitate to walk as Jesus asked them. We must place our trust in God, even in the darkest moments, and believe in his word before we see it fulfilled.

Walking Together

Each person’s life is a journey—sometimes rough, full of obstacles, exhausting, uphill. Yet Jesus invites us to always keep walking. He assures us that God acts in our lives when we accept the risk of moving forward, of dreaming, of taking risks, of building. Resignation and mediocrity make us spiritually sick and diminish our dignity. We must walk forward, supported by trust in God, continually invoking Jesus, never stopping.

Society’s life is also a journey we make together, but too often it is full of potholes that obstruct fraternity and assault human dignity. The ambition for power, the idolatry of money, authoritarianism, the oppression of the poor, and the selfish indifference of those who prefer to remain silent—these are some of the great potholes on the path toward a free, just, and equal society. Yet nothing should stop us from dreaming and fighting for a better, more humane world. The best way to predict the future is to create it.

The path itself is healing because it is the leaven of hope. Sick people and sick societies are healed by walking, not by remaining paralyzed and defeated by pessimism or fear. The healing of persons and societies happens not when we reach the goal, but when we have the courage to walk, even slowly. In each step of hope, a drop of healing is deposited; in each step fighting for freedom and justice, a new future emerges.

The lepers in the Gospel walked together, sharing the same faith and the same hope. In life we must learn to walk together, never alone. We need one another. In life, on the path of faith, and in our life together in society, we are not rivals but brothers and sisters, responsible for one another. Coherent living means taking responsibility for the one who has stopped walking and for the one who has lost the way. We must not walk in order to arrive first and monopolize privileges and applause, but rather to build together a new way of living in which we share our goods and interests in peace and justice, and where dissenting from power is not a crime.

The One Who Returned

All the lepers were cured, but the Gospel tells us that one of them, “finding himself cured, turned back praising God at the top of his voice and threw himself prostrate at the feet of Jesus and thanked him” (Lk 17:15-16). This man, instead of going to present himself to the priests, returned to Jesus to give thanks. He never reached the temple. He understood that salvation comes not from a religion indifferent to human suffering, but from a personal relationship with Jesus. He realized that more important than his healing was encountering once again the one who had healed him.

That leper was not only healed of leprosy, but received the fullness of life and salvation that only Jesus can give. When we thank God, we recognize the source of life and immerse ourselves in it as in a river of living waters. When we joyfully celebrate our faith in Jesus and are able to praise and give thanks to God, life is illuminated and flourishes, the heavens draw near, and the new world begins to emerge.

Bishop Silvio José Báez, o.c.d.

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua
Homily for the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time
12 October 2025

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0FyXetawls

Translation from the Spanish text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Jesus places his hand on the head of a healed leper in a gesture of compassion and comfort. Image by James Middleton / Adobe Stock (Asset ID: 915162531) | Generated with AI

#BishopSilvioJoséBáez #ChristianLife #healing #journey #socialJustice

Quote of the day, 15 March: Silvio José Báez, ocd

“Love your enemies” (Mt 5:44). This does not mean feeling sympathy or affection for those who have harmed us. Rather, it means refusing to hate, seeking no revenge, and being willing to do good to those who do not love us or have wronged us. It means loving with the same love with which God loves us.

Loving an enemy should not be confused with the demand that the guilty party be held accountable before a court of law.

This is not hypocrisy.

One may still feel antipathy and rejection toward the wrongdoer, but one chooses to go beyond feelings—deciding not to seek revenge or harbor hatred, and, if necessary, even to do good to them and pray for them. This is a gift from God.

Love for one’s enemy does not exclude but rather presupposes the need for the guilty party to face justice.

Silvio José Báez, O.C.D.

Auxiliary Bishop of Managua
16 June 2020

https://twitter.com/silviojbaez/status/1272859024648802310

Translation from the Spanish text is the blogger’s own work product and may not be reproduced without permission.

Featured image: Bishop Silvio José Báez, o.c.d. (left) and Archbishop Leopoldo Brenes (right) join in prayer at the Metropolitan Cathedral of Managua. Earlier that day, they had traveled to Saint Sebastian Basilica in Diriamba, Nicaragua, where they were attacked by pro-government sympathizers. Image credit: sj.baez / Facebook (Used by permission).

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"The Lord’s resurrection assures us that despite fears, failures, and threats, no effort we make to defend life, human dignity, and freedom ever will be lost."
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