According to ACI Prensa, CNA's Spanish language news partner, Álvarez, bishop of the Diocese of Matagalpa in Managua, was released on Monday but returned to custody Wednesday, July 5 after he refused to comply with the Ortega regime's demand that he go into exile.

Following reports from Nicaraguan media and human rights activists that he was released from "Modelo Prison" on Monday night, Álvarez, an outspoken critic of the communist Ortega dictatorship, has been returned to captivity.

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Despite requests from several journalists, the Vatican has kept silent on the detainment of Matagalpa's bishop.

Álvarez is known for criticising President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo.

The bishop had been prevented from leaving the diocesan office for 16 days along with 11 others as police maintained a constant presence outside.

Early on Friday, at least eight patrol cars were deployed to move the bishop to Nicaragua's capital, where he was placed under arrest in his family home.

Those who had been with Álvarez were taken to the infamous detention facility El Chipote, where some 190 political prisoners are being held. Several who have survived El Chipote describe it as a torture centre.

Nicaragua's National Police later confirmed that they carried out "an operation which permitted the recuperation of normalcy for Matagalpa's citizens and families.

"As destabilising and provocative activities persisted, the aforementioned public order operation was necessary," the police statement said.

To date, the only Vatican official who has spoken about the bishop's imprisonment is Mexican layman Rodrigo Guerra. He heads the Pontifical Commission for Latin America.

Speaking with Aleteia, Guerra said that Pope Francis "is well aware of all the events taking place in Nicaragua".

In recent years, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has treated the Catholic Church as a political enemy. He has arrested priests, expelled the Missionaries of Charity and apostolic nuncio and closed Catholic media outlets, and educational and charitable projects.

In a statement to ACI Prensa, Nicaraguan lawyer Martha Patricia Molina Montenegro, a member of the Pro-Transparency and Anti-Corruption Observatory, said that the Ortega dictatorship "is capable of anything" and "will always generate as much damage as possible".

Still, Montenegro has reason to hope while events unfold.

"I can assure you that this arbitrariness and attacks on the Church have united us more as Christians," she said, noting that "yesterday we were more than 3,500 families praying the Holy Rosary in the company of Bishop Rolando, through social media and thousands more who connected from other places."

"We are strengthened with that peace and tranquility that only the Holy Spirit provides," she continued.

"There is no human power that can put an end to this nefarious and criminal dictatorship. Victory will be given by the Lord."

Sources

CruxNow

UCA News

Catholic News Agency

CathNews New Zealand

Jagger is among the thousands of Nicaraguan Catholics in constant vigil for detained Bishop José Álvarez who has been under house arrest in northern Nicaragua with 11 companions since 4 August.

"I feel a great deal of worry and helplessness. I don't know how else to support Bishop Álvarez other than to use my voice, to join in prayer (for his liberation). He has been kidnapped," she said in a 12 August interview with Catholic News Service from London. "He is a hostage of a government that has committed crimes against humanity."

In a statement earlier this week, Jagger said she was "deeply saddened and concerned … by the silence of the Holy Father".

Jagger, who heads a human rights foundation bearing her name, has long used her global recognition to defend the afflicted, particularly in Latin America.

The rights of women and girls and the environment are at the forefront of her UK-based Bianca Jagger Human Rights Foundation. However, she often has spoken against the spiralling situation involving her native country, the repression of the populace, the fraudulent elections and now the attacks against the Catholic Church to which she belongs.

It harkens memories of darker times in the region.

"The assassination of Monseñor Romero," as Salvadoran St Oscar Romero is popularly known in Latin America, "had a great impact in my life" said Jagger.

St Oscar Romero spoke against the killing of innocent civilians and socioeconomic injustices perpetrated against the poorest sectors of the Salvadoran populace in neighbouring El Salvador. In 1980 he was fatally shot in a chapel as he celebrated Mass, a day after calling for a stop to government repression.

Modern-day Nicaragua in many ways mirrors that past, as priests, bishops and women and men religious have been attacked and harassed. Some have been expelled by the government of President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo, his wife.

When asked by Crux about Pope Francis' silence, Jagger stated, "I am deeply saddened and concerned, surprised, by the silence of the Holy Father".

Jagger has publicly appealed to Pope Francis to address the unfolding situation in Nicaragua.

"I am appealing to him not to order Bishop Rolando Alvarez to leave the country," she said, urging that "Getting rid of all the bishops and priests who stand up, who have the courage to stand up, is not the answer. The answer is to intercede, and speak up against the man who has declared a war against the Catholic Church."

Sources

Catholic News

Catholic News Agency

CathNews New Zealand

In response, the archdiocese called for the country's faithful to spend Friday praying and fasting and attend Mass at the Metropolitan Cathedral in Managua (pictured) on Saturday.

The banned procession was to be a closing ceremony for the country's Marian Congress. It was also a send-off for the Portuguese statue of Our Lady of Fatima.

The move came just a week after the Ortega government took seven Catholic radio stations off the air.

The stations were led by Bishop Rolando Alvarez, head of the Diocese of Matagalpa and Esteli. He is an outspoken Ortega critic.

Alvarez is the subject of an investigation for alleged conspiracy. He has been trapped in the diocese's episcopal palace, surrounded by police, for two weeks.

Relations between the Catholic Church and the Nicaraguan government have been tense since the Church tried to serve as a mediator in 2018 after an Ortega-backed social security proposal sparked nationwide protests.

The bishop has criticised the government for its repression of the populace. In turn, the government has accused the bishop of "organising violent groups" and encouraging them "to carry out acts of hate against the population".

In his homily for the August 11 Mass celebrated in the chancery chapel, Bishop Álvarez recalled that Christ taught that one must not harbour resentment. But you must always forgive, defeating "evil with the force and power of good".

"We are here, gathered together and under detention, already on the eighth day that we are spending today," he said at the beginning of the Eucharist. "Our eleven lives are in the hands of the Lord."

Álvarez assured that "painful experiences do not happen in vain; they don't fall into a void. These experiences are offered to the Lord, and God returns them in blessings for us".

The prelate said that when you want to harm another person, that "means the devil has managed to penetrate your heart and has managed to enter, infecting your heart. You shouldn't allow that."

"Evil is defeated by the power of good. Good is always more powerful. Good is eternally powerful. Evil is tremendously limited, even though it makes more noise," he noted.

The bishop of Matagalpa encouraged Nicaraguans not to fall into despair since "that's another temptation we face, because a people without hope is a self-entombed people".

Instead, he invited the faithful to be "inundated with the hope" of Christ who defeated death.

"Don't have the slightest doubt that the Lord is blessing you, because he is daily accepting our offering for you. And keep offering your prayers and supplications for us," he encouraged.

Sources

Reuters

Catholic News

Catholic News Agency

CathNews NZ

"I wanted to leave for the cathedral to do the holy hour, the holy Mass, but obviously the higher authorities haven't given permission, we are here ... shut up inside the diocesan offices," reported Álvarez, who is also the apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Estelí.

"Here we are going to remain without disrespecting the police; we have never disrespected them. I'm going to wait until they allow me to leave," added the prelate. He then blessed the police officers by making the sign of the cross over them.

A video released by a Nicaraguan human rights organisation shows Álvarez holding a monstrance with the Eucharist in a cordoned area of the street and a policeman preventing him from processing.

The video shows the policeman whispering something to the bishop.

"You're the ones who didn't cooperate," the bishop answered him. He explained that he was trying to do what is customary for him on Thursdays, to expose the Eucharist and pray.

Riot police have also prevented Father Uriel Vallejos and a group of faithful from leaving the rectory of Jesus of the Divine Mercy parish in the town of Sébaco.

The confinement of the priest and parishioners began after the police forced their way into his parish to shut down the Catholic radio station that operated on the premises. Vallejos is the radio station's director.

Bishop Álvarez also coordinated a network of Catholic radio stations that the Nicaraguan government recently shut down by order of the government for allegedly not having a valid operating licence since 2003.

However, the diocese reported that Alvarez said that in 2016 he personally presented the required documentation and never received a reply.

It is widely believed the stations were shut down because it was critical of the administration of President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo.

President Ortega, who has been in power for 15 years, has been openly hostile to the Catholic Church in Nicaragua.

Ortega alleged the bishops were part of an attempted coup to drive him out of office in 2018 because they supported anti-government demonstrations that his regime brutally suppressed. The Nicaraguan president has called the bishops "terrorists" and "devils in cassocks".

Sources

• Catholic News Agency
• Catholic News
• CathNews NZ