JUBILEE YEAR for the CENTENNIAL of BLESSED
ROMERO, 2016 — 2017
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| Tiberio Romero photo |
The Romero family
portrait in this historical photograph presents the mother Guadalupe Romero Galdamez, center, with her children, from left to right, Oscar Arnulfo, Zaida,
Romulo and the eldest, Gustavo. The photo was taken on November 21, 1922, when
Blessed Oscar Romero was 5 years old and is, in fact, the earliest known photo
of Oscar Romero as a child, published online for the first time in this blog.
The photo is part of our series on Romero in images for the Romero Jubilee Year
declared by the Church for the centenary of the Salvadoran martyr.
Apart from the
date it was taken, recorded by the Romero family, almost the entire context of
the picture remains unknown—which beckons us to reconstruct it. It is
easy to deduce that it was taken in San Miguel, probably in a photography
studio, because Ciudad Barrios surely did not have such facilities at that
time. The date is significant—November 21 is the feast day in San Miguel, and
it is likely that the family made the trip from Barrios to San Miguel for the celebrations.
The previous
year, on November 21, 1921, the provincial patron, Our Lady of Peace, had been
solemnly crowned in San Miguel by mandate of Pope Benedict XV, and this first
anniversary would surely have been a great commemoration of that act.
After Blessed Romero was ordained a priest, one of his major commissions would be
taking care of the miraculous image of the Virgin, whose figure was seen
prominently on the altar of his beatification in May 2015. Notably absent in
the portrait is the father of the Blessed, Santos Romero. By all accounts,
Santos Romero was not a very religious person at the time.
A year earlier,
little Oscar had suffered a serious illness—almost certainly, polio—limiting his
ease of movement for a long time, and leading his father to give him the
unfortunate nickname, “the paralytic.” In fact, the photo shows a somewhat slouching
posture and perhaps a faraway gaze in Oscar in contrast to the other children.
According to
Romero biographer Roberto Morozzo della Rocca, “Romero never had an easy relationship with his body. He suffered from
insomnia and was easily irritated ... In fact, many of his sufferings were the
normal everyday pains of a person who simply was sensitive, who did not shun
responsibilities and who followed a biographical path which was not banal ...
Romero liked the life he lived, one of intense work, taking on the problems of
others, devoting himself entirely to a cause. He would never have traded his
ideal of holiness for a quiet, obscure and nondescript life, for a good
retirement.”
At the tender
age of five, this picture presents the image of a martyr child.
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