Embattled parish:

...Luke that get their advocates shot by death squads...

...Father Hennessey did the consecration, of course, and gave the homily, but the readings, prayers, music (and, of course, "offering"), were all done by lay people, who had been well coached in their parts by a wonderful Catholic sister who works part-time at the parish...

...But when it was time for Arthur McGovern, an American Jesuit, to speak, he did so in Spanish that was much better than he had previously led our group to believe...

...This Church is Mined...

...The range and erratic character of their aim is enshrined (perhaps permanently, since this is a poor parish) on the walls and roof of the hall that serves as the parish church...

...The military later returned with piles of weapons and crates of ammunition, which they placed prominently inside the church building...

...We probably won't have a large congregation this morning," Father Hennessey told us, "even though it is Epiphany...

...The most notable thing about the Mass to me as a Protestant was that in spite of the presence of clergy, the liturgy was almost entirely lay run...

...And then the Mass was over...

...There were several references during the service to these strange-looking "three kings" who had arrived on Epiphany looking for the Christ child...

...No use has yet been made of the photographs taken in the church...

...They know there could be either guns or cameras trained on the entrances...

...A five-minute ride in the van brought us to El Paraiso (which means just what it sounds like), a base community that has been nurturing its members for seventeen years with an alternative vision of what life can be, and is incomprehensible without its Christian rootage...

...But I have no trouble at all, and am indeed strengthened by, the notion of going to El Salvador to seek a Christ child who is a "savior," and I must testify that I found him, not in a stable but in a pockmarked church, embodied in the children of 150 of the "despised and rejected" of the world...

...So the three gringos went in to celebrate Epiphany with a congregation that included lots of children but fewer adults than usual...

...We know we are all children of God...

...This is almost a parable of what is happening in the country...

...He found the parish priest, Ron Hennessey of Marykoll, who introduced the old man not as the caretaker but as the father of Octavio Ortiz, one of the early priest-martyrs of El Salvador, a land that has subsequently had many priest-martyrs...

...The army removed the weapons as soon as the photographs were taken...

...In Zacamil it is the presumably unimportant people who do the important things, bringing children into the world, scratching a living out of recalcitrant soil, putting their lives on the line for justice, and dispensing the bread of life...

...Back at the beginning a group of indigent members of the parish realized that the thing they most needed was shelter, and they set about to provide it by starting a small factory for the manufacture of cement blocks, initially financed by church gifts from overseas...

...At this point I received a modest visitation from the Holy Spirit, who empowered me, much to my surprise, to stumble through some remarks about how the original magi had found a child at the end of their journey, and how we modern magi had found children at the end of ours, and that perhaps the epiphany or "manifestation" of God in our time would come through them...

...In the wake of this I made an impetuous decision to try to speak in Spanish myself, an "Espanol gringo" that is much worse than I had previously led our group to believe...

...Once they had provided houses for themselves, they started selling the blocks, and have been doing so ever since as their basic means of support...

...Yes, Octavio Ortiz is dead, but what he represented will be transmitted to the children of that parish, and they will grow up with a vision for the future so compelling that the principalities and powers in El Salvador can only feel threatened by it, as was Herod...

...Even before the recent military offensive in El Salvador, Zacamil was known for its "forward-looking" concerns about the social order-the same sorts of ideas found in Amos, Isaiah, and St...

...the reserved Sacrament was spilled, the host ground into the floor...

...Toward the end of the service, the "three kings" were asked to share some of their concerns with the congregation...

...I have a lot of trouble placing myself in a regal role, and one of the parishioners afterward expressed the hope that the "negative kings" from afar of imperialism and domination might be persuaded to leave her land...

...We may be poor," one of the inhabitants said, "but we have dignity...

...But it was not really over...

...one conjecture is that they are being saved for use as "evidence" should any priest of the parish later be brought to trial...

...During the recent fighting in El Salvador, the co-op was hemmed in on all sides, and in the random bombing and strafing by government forces, a brother and sister, among others, were both wounded...

...If that warping is not permanent, it will be in large part because of the love and care and commitment of the extended family that is El Paraiso and Iglesia Cristo Salvador in Zacamil...

...A further twist on the story is that Jennifer Casolo, who was indicted for allegedly burying arms in her yard for the FMLN, frequently came to services at Zacamil and that members of the parish anticipated that "evidence" of hidden arms in several places she frequented would help pave the way for her prosecution...

...When we went forward during the Mass to receive Holy Communion, it was the father of Octavio Ortiz who gave us the bread of life...

...when they were released, all of the emergency supplies for the hungry and wounded people in the war zone had been expropriated...

...But one woman said we must go with her to see the Christian cooperative that had been established by people associated with the parish...

...and the portrait of Octavio Ortiz on the rear wall was riddled with bullet holes, as though dying itself were not a sufficient price to pay for one's faith...

...The office was entered, its equipment stolen and files destroyed...

...We had a translator who gave his own beautiful statement of what it meant to be there, and who was with us partly to facilitate conversation across the language barrier...

...Whether they got the drift or not I will never know, but the message is one about which I feel strongly after our visit...

...ROBERT McAFEE BROWN Robert McAfee Brown is the author of the forthcoming book, Gustavo Gutierrez: An Introduction to Liberation Theology (Orbis Books), to be published this spring...

...So when the fighting broke out in November between the government forces and the FMLN, it was a foregone conclusion that the parish of Cristo Salvador would be high on the list of buildings (together with its occupants) that the army would target...

...Right on schedule the military came in shooting...

...When an American Jesuit and a Salvadoran church worker arrived with five hundred pounds of corn and medicine for the parish, they were detained...

...Then they took photographs of the cache, which could later be used to "prove" that the people of Iglesia Cristo Salvador had been stockpiling arms for the rebels, were thus Communists, and were thus appropriate targets for permanent disposal by the military...

...Their distraught mother was unable to get them to a hospital for eleven hours, due to the unwillingness of the military forces to let them out...

...But after eight months in exile they returned and remain active in the community...

...Many people are still too frightened to be seen in church as a result of all the shooting...

...After completing the destruction and desecration of the interior of the church, the army left, locking the door with a huge padlock and tacking up a sign that read: "Warning...

...The real victims are the innocent, the children, those whose lives may be permanently warped by the gruesome experiences of early childhood, experiences supported by the military aid our government provides their government...

...Our initial request to walk around the parish with members of the church was vetoed on the grounds that such an action would endanger the lives of those who accompanied us...

...REPORT FROM EL SALVADOR EMBATTLED PARISH GRINGO MAGI FIND JESUS The old man who helped the three of us out of the van in front of the Cristo Salvador parish church in the Zacamil area of San Salvador was clearly the caretaker...

...In an important sense it was only beginning, as the people left to engage in the precarious task of translating what happened inside the building to what was going on outside the building...

...The leaders got into trouble for starting a cooperativa, which of course was interpreted by the government as being communista, and were forced to flee from the country...