at Oscar. “What do you say, Oscar? Do you want to become a priest? Learn the Gregorian chants?”
“I’ve always dreamt I would be a priest.”
“How about your parents? What do they say about your hopes?” the vicar-general asked.
“I don’t know if Papá would like it,” Oscar said. “He’s apprenticed me to a carpenter.”
“To my brother Juan,” Mayor Leiva put in.
While Oscar was dutiful in serving as Juan Leiva’s apprentice, sawing boards to fashion tables, doors, and coffins wasn’t what he envisioned for his future.
“Jesus worked as a carpenter before he began his ministry,” the vicar said. “You’d be following his example. And how about your mother?”
“She would like me to be a priest, if that’s what I want,” Oscar replied.
“Let’s talk with Don Santos later,” the mayor said to the vicar and Father Calvo. “It’s a big commitment to send a son off for many years of schooling.”
The mayor turned to Oscar. “We’ll see what your Papá has to say.”
“Thank you.” Oscar had no idea how Papá would respond to the idea. His going off to study would mean Oscar would not bring any income into the household. What’s more, he’d create new expenses for his parents.
After the churchmen left to return to San Miguel, Papá spoke with Oscar. “They’ve offered you a half scholarship,” he said. “The mayor speaks highly of your abilities and hard work.”
“Can we afford the other half of the tuition?” Oscar asked.
“It’ll be difficult, but we’ll give it a try. Father Calvo thought I’d be able to pay in coffee beans.”
“Thank you, Papá. I won’t disappoint you.” Oscar set his firm jaw in determination.
“Father Calvo left a list of clothing and other items you’ll need to take,” Papá said. “He’ll be back early next year and you’ll return to San Miguel with him.”
In the weeks ahead, Oscar thought about the people in his life who made it possible for him to follow his dream.
Papá, for one. Oscar chafed less at Papá’s iron hand at the helm of the household than did his brothers.14 Oscar feared Papá, but he was naturally obedient and therefore avoided some of the punishments Papá imposed. He also recognized how Papá gave them advantages not available to most other village children. He read books to them, encouraged their love of music, and taught them skills such as Morse code. He had taken time to teach Oscar how to read music and play an instrument.
Then there was Mamá, patient and understanding, who involved herself with each of her children.15 She modeled kindness. Whenever poor people came by the house, she invited them in for coffee, never looking down on those less fortunate. Oscar hoped to show such faith and charity.
Both parents sacrificed to pay Maestra Anita for Oscar’s three years of tutoring, and neither Zaída nor his brothers resented him for this extra opportunity.
Oscar owed a debt of gratitude to the mayor, who went out of his way to speak on his behalf, as did the priests who served his town.
It seemed as if God’s hand brought these people together so he might take the next steps to priesthood; as a Bible verse says: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”16 Now Oscar looked forward to God’s future plans for him.
4. Chapter 2 is based on 1998 interviews the author had in El Salvador with Oscar’s surviving siblings—Zaída, Mamerto, Arnoldo, and Gaspar—as well as with one of his half sisters; a first cousin on his mother’s side; a woman who as a young teen had worked for Niña Jesus in the household; and a preseminary classmate who later served for two periods as parish priest of Ciudad Barrios, where he came to know the people who had known Oscar in his youth.
Many details come from Don Santos’s “little black book,” then in Tiberio Arnoldo Romero’s possession. In the notebook, Santos jotted births and deaths, the towns and years in which he had served as telegrapher, various recipes for herbal medicines, amounts of money owed and paid, dates of major purchases, and similar details. Information was also gleaned from Jiménez and Navarrete, Reseña; Brockman, A Life; and Delgado, Biografía.
5. Brockman says the church official who visited Ciudad Barrios in 1930 for Father Monroy’s first hometown mass was the vicar-general of the San Miguel diocese (A Life, 35). Jiménez and Navarrete identify him as Monseñor Daniel Ventura Cruz, who “upon learning of Oscar Arnulfo’s calling, was interested in his studies and became the primary advocate of his vocation” (Reseña, 8). Almost two decades later, in a funeral oration for Ventura Cruz, Romero apologized for his failure to say anything at the earlier burial; he had been too torn up, mourning the loss of this prelate who had counseled and helped mold him as a young priest (Chaparrastique, no. 1715, April 10, 1948).
6. Father Benito Calvo Quinto, a Claretian brother from Spain, had been trekking to the town every so often to offer mass following the death of Father Cecilio Morales, the parish priest who had baptized Oscar on May 11, 1919, when Oscar was going on two years old.
7. The author speculates the name may have been Vallena, a wordplay on she goes full (as in milk) or the homonym Ballena, meaning whale, or it may have had no meaning. Oscar’s father named the cow; the surviving offspring did not know its meaning.
8. Names and birth dates of Oscar’s siblings are: Roque Gustavo, October 19, 1911; Aminta Isabel, September 11, 1913 (died as an infant); Oscar Arnulfo, August 15, 1917; Zaída Emerita, October 5, 1919; Rómulo Plutarco, December 2, 1921; Mamerto Obdulio, May 15, 1924; Tiberio Arnoldo, September 13, 1926; Santos Gaspar, September 15, 1929. The children also had three natural, or half sisters, in town by their father and two other women. The sisters were, according to Oscar’s brother Mamerto: Rubia de La O de Esperanza, Rosa Portillo Esperanza, and Candelaria Portillo. Natural, or out-of-wedlock, children were common and accepted. “We got along well and we visited one another. We didn’t have any problems,” Mamerto Romero said of relationships between Santos Romero’s legitimate and natural children.
Father Carlos L. Villacorta, one of the seminarians Romero mentored, explained in an August 5, 1999, phone conversation with the author that churchmen didn’t speak out against natural children because “75 to 80 percent of Salvadoran families have illegitimate children.”
9. In addition to the concert flute, according to Tiberio Arnoldo Romero, his father owned two other fine possessions: a pocket watch and a steelyard weighing scale.
10. Tiberio Arnoldo Romero believed his mother had taught school locally for a period before her marriage.
