Tapestries of Roman Catholic Archbishop Oscar Romero (left) and Pope Paul VI (right) hang from a balcony of St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican on Saturday. /AFP
Slain Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero and Pope Paul VI, Catholic giants who sparked controversy during their lifetimes, will join the church’s highest rank Sunday with an elevation to sainthood.
Pope Francis will wear a blood-stained rope belt which belonged to Romero, who was murdered at the altar, as he leads the ceremony in front of some 60,000 pilgrims and heads of state from across the world.
The pontiff will also use a chalice and pastoral staff belonging to Paul VI in a canonisation being seen as a reminder of Francis’s call for “a poor church for the poor.”
Both men have been hailed by Francis for their courage in turbulent times and their dedication to social justice and the downtrodden.
Their giant portraits were unfurled on Saint Peter’s Basilica along with those of five other new saints, including an orphaned youth and a German nun.
Romero stood up for peasant rights in the face of a right-wing backlash which painted him as a radical supporter of “liberation” theology in his small, impoverished Central American nation.
His radio sermons condemning government repression came to be heard throughout the land.
On March 24, 1980, the man dubbed the “voice of those without voice” was shot in the heart, killed by a single bullet as he prepared communion at the start of a bloody civil war which claimed some 75,000 lives.