OPINION: Fighting lies and oppression  

One of the most important legacies of World Youth Day is the opportunity to listen to important religious leaders from around the world. Thus, the Nicaraguan Bishop Silvio Báez shared with pilgrims and Panamanians alike the challenge of resisting the attacks of the Daniel Ortega regime in Nicaragua. Bishop Báez defends freedom of expression as a way to protect diversity and human dignity. For Báez, without freedom of expression, people lose the ability to know the truth. As it currently happens in Nicaragua. And is that all dictatorships have in common that they are enemies of freedom of expression and independent media. Authoritarian regimes fear heroes who like Bishop Báez, are capable of facing lies and oppression with the clear and simple verb of truth. Báez represents the living tradition of the committed and responsible priesthood, exemplified by Saint Óscar Arnulfo Romero, Salvadoran archbishop assassinated by the death squads. Father Héctor Gallego, who disappeared in the mountains of Venezuela during the military dictatorship, came from that same tradition. That is why the struggle for freedom in Nicaragua, and throughout the world, has in Bishop Báez one of its greatest allies-LA PRENSA, Jan. 26