opinion

The Virgin Mary: once again at the crux of the Nicaraguan divide
by Silvio Sirias

Message on El Pueblo Presidente, Daniel Ortega’s official website

Beginning in August of this year, supporters of Daniel Ortega’s presidency began to hold vigils in several of Managua’s traffic roundabouts to “pray against hate” --- an official Danielista slogan. In mid-November, a few days after the municipal elections, large images of the Virgin Mary, in her guise as the Immaculate Conception, appeared mysteriously, overnight, on the two roundabouts where the vigils were most commonly held and where, during the recent civil disturbances, Sandinistas congregated to wave black and red flags --- the party colors.

Although no organization or government agency officially claims responsibility for the Virgins’ sudden appearance --- the images were placed on concrete pedestals and bolted down with reinforced steel bars --- virtually every press report says that it was the work of Sandinistas, and the party has yet to issue a denial of this assertion.

The opposition --- who profess to be the “legitimate” Catholics --- has denounced the placing of the statues in the roundabouts as a cynical move on the part of the Sandinistas: the manipulation of a sacred Catholic symbol for political purposes.

And then tensions spilled over when, under the cover of night, persons unknown splashed one of the images with red paint, the color of the Liberal Party, the Sandinistas’ most noted opposition. According to reports in El Nuevo Diario the effect was dramatic: the Virgin looked as if she had uncontrollably shed buckets of blood red tears. An anonymous group soon removed the paint; but that same night someone took a sledge-hammer to the statue and pounded away until the Virgin’s face was completely destroyed and the image had been knocked off the concrete pedestal.

The Nicaraguan Council of Catholic Bishops has asked the government to remove the images to avoid further desecration of a religious symbol that’s important to Nicaraguan Catholics. As of yet, the request has been ignored.

I’ve been watching these events with both fascination and concern. The controversy surrounding the apparition of the Virgin Mary in the Chontales town of Cuapa --- an event fully accepted by the Nicaraguan Catholic Church --- constitutes the central conflict of my novel Bernardo and the Virgin. After Mary appeared to Bernardo Martínez, he shared his visions and, as a result, unwittingly found himself in the center of a political storm --- a vortex so harrowing that the seer eventually had to take refuge for several years in a seminary. And throughout the rest of the country, belief in or rejection of Bernardo’s vision became the litmus test of whether a person was against or for the Sandinistas and their Revolution.

Nicaraguans, then, have treaded this path before. Several priests who have served in various Central American nations have assured me that Nicaragua is the most Marian nation in the region. That is, the people’s devotion to the Virgin is palpable to the point where at least one priest confessed that he was baffled --- and even a little concerned --- by the Nicaraguans’ love for Mary because, in his eyes at least, it made devotion to her son, Jesus, seem secondary. In fact, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception --- largely celebrated on the night of December 7, the eve of the actual commemoration --- outranks Christmas Day in importance, hence the Sandinistas’ call for government functionaries to celebrate the day with “enthusiasm and religious fervor.”

Once again, then, the Virgin Mary has been placed at the heart of a political tempest to gaze down upon a fully divided Nicaragua. What I find baffling is that the Sandinistas have now embraced her when in the 80s they did everything within their power to censor the news of her appearance and to discredit Bernardo Martínez. Now, the questions that keep coming to mind are: what do Daniel Ortega’s followers have to gain by appropriating Mary? Do they, since their rejection of the apparition in Cuapa proved disastrous in the 80s, wish to cut off the opposition before dissidents rally anew around Nicaragua’s devotion to Mary? What exactly is Daniel’s strategy?

The Sandinistas’ move appears to be a certain blunder, a feeble attempt by Daniel Ortega and his followers to co-op the figure of Mary before she, once more, like in the 80s, galvanizes the opposition. But above all, the Sandinistas’ push to pass as devout followers of this religious figure, who’s central to their compatriot’s spiritual belief system, is so transparent, so insincere --- because faith cannot be falsified for long --- that it’s, without a doubt, destined to backfire and fail.

Silvio Sirias is an award-winning novelist who writes and resides in Panama. His first novel, Bernardo and the Virgin, deals precisely with the important role that the Virgin Mary and faith played during the Sandinista Revolution. For more information, visit his website at http://www.silviosirias.com