Abelardo Mata, the 80-year-old bishop emeritus of Estelí, Nicaragua, was detained for several hours on June 29 by the dictatorship’s police, one day after celebrating a Mass where he called for prayers for the persecuted Church in the country.
Around midday on Monday, the prelate was taken into police custody from a clinic to the Investigations Center at the Evaristo Vásquez Sánchez Police Complex, known as “El Nuevo Chipote,” a notorious facility where political dissidents have been imprisoned and allegedly tortured.
According to Nicaraguan journalist Arnulfo Peralta Solís, Mata returned to his home in Tisma later that same day. Peralta had spoken with the bishop on May 18 during Mata’s first public appearance in years.
Mata had arrived in Estelí on June 25 and celebrated Mass on June 28 at the Calvary’s Cross church, where he asked for prayers for the persecuted Church and prayed for exiled priests, including Bishop Rolando Álvarez and Father Frutos Constantino Valle Salmerón.
Authorities reportedly bar Mata from traveling to Estelí and celebrating Mass there. He had visited a clinic for a checkup related to his pacemaker.
“Bishop Emeritus Juan Abelardo Mata has been a bishop close to the people who has spoken the truth, actions that the Sandinista dictatorship does not tolerate,” said researcher Martha Patricia Molina, author of the report “Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church.”
“In Nicaragua, anyone who dares to voice an opinion, however obvious it may seem, ends up offending the dictatorship and that’s why they keep the prelates under surveillance,” Molina added.
Arturo McFields, Nicaragua’s former ambassador to the Organization of American States, called Mata “a strong, courageous voice that has always spoken truth to power.”
Bishop Silvio Báez, auxiliary bishop of Managua currently in exile in Miami, condemned the act, writing on X: “These cowardly actions only demonstrate the weakness and irrationality of a criminal dictatorship.”
