DAILY CATHOLIC     MONDAY     June 7, 1999     vol. 10, no. 109

NEWS & VIEWS
from a CATHOLIC perspective

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JUSTICE IS NOT WON THROUGH INJUSTICE

Letter of Archbishop of Cali to Colombian Kidnappers

          BOGOTA, JUN 6 (ZENIT).- Archbishop Isaias Duarte of Cali, Colombia, has written a letter to the NLA guerrillas, who kidnapped more than a hundred people last Sunday while they were attending Mass, pleading for them to listen to reason. "You of the National Liberation Army (NLA) have committed a grave error, a terrible crime and an indescribable act of cowardice," he wrote.

          The letter is notable for its sincerity and clarity. "Have you stopped to think, at least for a moment, of the evil you are doing, of the damage you are causing, and of the suffering you are inflicting on innumerable people, who are the victims of the insensitivity of your actions?" Archbishop Duarte asked the guerrillas.

          The Archbishop added, "It is not by committing injustice that justice is won, nor by attacking innocent beings that one achieves peace."

          Archbishop Duarte, who already excommunicated the terrorists, asserted: "What you have done places you indisputably outside the Church, if you still have any sense of belonging to it. In the end, it is not possible to be a Catholic by hating, murdering, kidnapping, violating religious liberty, and ignoring the most elementary human rights."

          The Archbishop nonetheless appealed to the guerrillas to return to God. "The human being can turn around, acknowledge his faults, repent of these and do reparation, at least in principle, for the damage caused. The Lord generously forgives the person who turns to Him."

          The way offered by the Archbishop to express this change of attitude is, perhaps, obvious: "the immediate liberation of the persons who are being held by you, so unjustly deprived of their liberty." ZE990600410


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June 7, 1999       volume 10, no. 109
NEWS & VIEWS

DAILY CATHOLIC

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