Schools invited to sign up to Spirit of Romero Day

A new initiative is encouraging Catholic and other schools and colleges to unite in showing solidarity and support for social justice campaigners – and the current Food Enough for Everyone IF campaign.

Just1 has arranged for them to sign up as Spirit of Romero Schools and share out simple actions among pupils, staff, school councils, governors, PTAs and others.

Duties for schools include pupils setting aside a few minutes in assembly or classroom on a specific Spirit of Romero Day – Wednesday 20 March this year.

Organiser Hugh Gibbons says: “The purpose is to have an opportunity to appreciate, thank and acclaim the world’s ‘voices for the voiceless’ – the millions of campaigners for social justice, peace, equality, dignity and human rights.”

Schools are also encouraged to commend the End Hunger campaigns being directed at leaders of the G8 gathering in June. These include the Food Enough for All IF campaign, of which CAFOD, ScIAF, Trocaire and Progressio and Just1 are members. In the UK, School Councils are invited to write a letter to the Secretary of State for International Development.

Hugh says: “Each year, many Catholic schools and colleges pay tribute to the life and legacy of Archbishop Oscar Romero in their own way around the anniversary of his assassination on 24 March. It seemed that getting young people acting in his spirit for social justice would be a good idea all round – especially as a contribution to Year of Faith. You need to be 18 to take part in the formal on-line and paper petitions to the Prime Minister. But schools can commend the campaigns to the leaders of governments.”

The first day of Spring, Wednesday 20 March, was chosen for the first Spirit of Romero Day. It is during the school week in the run up to the annual United Nations Day for the Right to Truth Concerning Gross Human Rights Violations and for the Dignity of Victims. The UN set this for 24 March, as a tribute to the life and legacy of Romero.

Other duties of Spirit of Romero Schools are having a member of staff or governing body become a Friend of the ecumenical UK charity Romero Trust. Schools are asked to display one of the small wooden Romero Crosses hand-made by family artists in El Salvador. And PTAs might make IF Campaign banners to go outside schools during May and June.

Bishops also have a chance to play a part. The Spirit of Romero website has a page showing Palmaditas en la Espada – a couple of sentences to give a public pat on the back to schools in dioceses for their support for social justice through the years.

The concept should chime especially in those schools and colleges that are a habitat for Catholic social teaching, where there's a long tradition of supporting CAFOD, SCIAF, Trocaire, CRS or others of the 160+ aid agencies in Caritas Internationalis.

The Day's intended as a March-time complement to Just1's October's Stand Up & Sing Out Against Poverty by which tens of thousands of pupils and teachers have marked the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty - through the Just1 Promises to the Poor based on the Millennium Development Goals.

Full information including a downloadable slideshow briefing for teachers, the suggested ceremony on Spirit of Romero Day, outline of letters, and sign-up forms. is available at: www.just1.org.uk/spiritofromero