Blood and Ink: Ignacio Ellacuria, Jon Sobrino, and the Jesuit Martyrs of the University of Central America.

Bucher, Henry Hale, Jr.

Blood and Ink: Ignacio Ellacuria, Jon Sobrino, and the Jesuit Martyrs of the University of Central America.

By Robert Lassalle-Klein. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2014. Pp. xxiii, 357. Paperback $34.

When the president of the Jesuit University of Central America (UCA) in El Salvador, Fr. Ignacio Ellacuria, SJ, was assassinated in the early hours of November 16, 1989, by a unit of the U.S.-trained Atlacatl Battalion, the order of Colonel Benavides was to leave no witnesses. Thus six other priests, their housekeeper, and her daughter were also killed. One of the six was Fr. Juan Ramon Moreno, beside whose body was found a blood-soaked copy of The Crucified God, by Jurgen Moltmann. The blood and ink on the pages of Moltmann's classic not only provided the title of Robert Lassalle-Klein's book but also raise the question, How can a Christian university grounded in God's preferential option for the poor take the "crucified people" of El Salvador down from the cross?

The book's extraordinary depth and detail provide minute puzzle-pieces that document events and atrocities, but they also describe the real-life context in which the Jesuits of UCA taught, analyzed reality, and ministered. Their congregants were thirsty for a theology that spoke to the Salvadoran reality. Lassalle-Klein insightfully describes how UCA decided to do in "its university way" what Msgr. Oscar Romero had done in "his pastoral way" by demanding justice for El Salvador's poor (185). In 1980, while blessing communion elements during mass, the archbishop was assassinated on the orders of Maj. Roberto D'Aubisson.

Ellacurfa's theology is clearly explained as he deals with the reality of the poor masses; he sees Christ in the witness of Archbishop Romero and massacred peasants. The last sections continue the theological dialogue about how those who suffer can be taken down from the cross to participate in the resurrection of a society where love and justice reign.

Comparing the role of the United States in El Salvador to that of Rome in the time of Christ, this book sees new hope and strength for the masses in the blood of the martyrs. There is great mystery here; Blood and Ink challenges us to be transformed by it.

Henry Hale Bucher Jr. is chaplain emeritus and associate professor emeritus at Austin College, Sherman, Texas.