-You can't come out with that now.
-Why?
-It's forbidden.
-Why is it forbidden?
-I can't tell you anything else.
-Why is it forbidden?
The images you see are from Nicaragua. Under the regime of President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo, Holy Week processions have been banned. Exiled journalists in the country say the situation has reached a breaking point.
MARLING BALMACEDA
They have restricted the Church to not being able to go out, not being able to leave their parish. Any processions have to take place within the church's perimeter, almost inside the church.
The newspaper Artículo 66 reported that, while Vice President Murillo forbids processions of the Church, she promotes parades with copied images of the saints. They stated that she aims to replace the Church with her own spirituality.
MARLING BALMACEDA
What it does is set up replicas. And those replicas are the ones that go out to the public, to the different traditional routes that are done in these processions. That's what it's done. She has set it up that way and she continues with criticism, talking about the priests and the Church itself as demons.
She wants to dictate the type of worship that has to be performed in Nicaragua and it is practically a cult of her personality and thinking.
The regime has already arrested two protestors and three parishioners who have gone in public wearing traditional religious clothing. It has also expelled a priest from the country for organizing a procession.
RM
TR: AT
