According to Nicaragua Actual, the two were released hours later with the warning not to mention the bishop again.
“For all these reasons, given the attempt to silence the prayers of the Nicaraguan people, ACN asks benefactors around the world to further redouble their prayers for the Nicaraguan Church,” the foundation urged.
Thus the Church in Nicaragua will be able to feel that it is “accompanied in the challenge that it is experiencing at this time and can continue to proclaim the Gospel and accompany its people, especially the weakest and poorest,” ACN said.
“The foundation is dismayed by the news it regularly receives of priests who have not been allowed to return to the country, of visa restrictions for men and women religious, of the control and surveillance of the movements of priests and bishops, listening in on homilies as well as the prohibition of processions and religious celebrations,” the statement noted.
In August 2022, Regina Lynch, ACN’s director of international projects, stated at that time that she was already observing “an attempt to silence the Church in Nicaragua.”
One of the latest low points in the Nicaraguan dictatorship’s persecution of the Church was the recent sentencing of Álvarez to 26 years and four months in prison as a “traitor to the homeland” convicted of “undermining national security and sovereignty” and “spreading fake news.” The bishop was also stripped of his Nicaraguan citizenship.