Dear World,

Once again the United States of America has quietly watched acts of complete contradiction happen within one of their most powerful institutions without batting an eye. On Nov. 19, a Catholic priest committed an act of civil disobedience, was arrested and was processed.

Just for information’s sake, his complaint was lodged against the U.S. Army’s School of the Americas, an institution involved with military training of Latin American soldiers.

The United Nations and other human rights non-governmental organizations have long condemned the organization for training soldiers and commanders who have been involved in blatantly illegitimate coups, assassinations and military actions against unarmed, innocent people.

The priest, Fr. Lawrence Biondi, S.J., joined thousands of Americans who are asking for a closure of the Cold War dinosaur and joined a formal act of demonstration in which they marched onto the base. The act is legally an act of trespassing on U.S. government property.

While the School of the Americas has been a point of debate in the U.S. Congress for a decade, it was the act of this priest that adds an interesting twist.

Biondi, a Jesuit priest, is the president of Saint Louis University, located in the city with which it shares its name, a location known for its strong Catholic population.

A powerful political figure in local politics, Biondi made national Catholic headlines when he engaged the archdiocese of St. Louis in a battle surrounding the sale of the University’s financially failing hospital. That incident brought to light a conflict between the Jesuit’s understanding of what is theirs and where their place is within the Catholic hierarchy.

Yet, this latest action by Biondi illustrates an even greater hypocrisy in the Roman-based religion. The issue of whether to oppose the School of Americas (since renamed by the U.S. government) has been a matter of conflict within the Church.

Prime targets of the Latin American governments who utilize the school’s trainees have been priests engaging in liberation theology. This form of Catholic teaching uses the example of Jesus Christ to illustrate the human rights that should be recognized in all people, even the oppressed indigenous peoples of the Central American nations. While this form of teaching has since lessened since the 1970s, the Communist-paranoid Vatican has condemned the practice, and continues to encourage the poor to simply accept their plight.

All this is despite proof that School graduates were directly responsible for the assassinations of archbishops in El Salvador and Guatemala, six Jesuit priests in San Salvador, their housekeeper and her teenage daughter, and four U.S. churchwomen.

One hundred of the U.S. Catholic bishops signed a statement demanding the closing of the school, yet many refuse to join the call, knowing that Rome is hardly convinced of the School’s evil effects.

St. Louis Archbishop Rev. Justin Rigali is often criticized for refusing to join the list condemning the school for fear of losing opportunities of promotion within the Church.

Yet Fr. Biondi risked the disapproval of wealthy benefactors and alumni to speak out on an issue about which he feels strongly.

As a member of the high-profile Catholic clergy, he has chosen to fight for justice in the cases of his fallen brothers and sister, instead of dropping into the cowardly silence that has covered his fellow religious leaders.

While he was calling upon the United States to recognize its oppressive effects upon people to the south, he made an equally alarming plea to his bosses to support the workers and martyrs who fight for the justice Jesus so avidly fought for. For Catholics, let us pray his call does not fall on deaf ears.