Oct. 14, 2018 was the happiest day of my life. Although I could not be in Rome, in the Vatican, to witness the canonization of Monsignor Oscar Romero, who fought for the disadvantaged people of the smallest country in Central America, El Salvador, whose death went unpunished, is now a Holy Saint.

In 1982, I had the courage to undertake a journey and emigrate to the most powerful country, the United States, escaping a meaningless war that left so many dead, of which they remain unpunished because the injustice of a corrupt regime, which still continues for those who are voiceless. It is not easy to be an immigrant in a strange country where I had to face a different culture, learn a new language, to be able to get ahead and not get stuck thinking about what I had left behind in my little “pulgarcito”, meaning my small home country, which is slang for El Salvador.

I do not remember having a happy adolescence in my own home country. I felt confined and overwhelmed to see so much blood run and deaths day to day. At meal times, I did not know if I could finish because all I expected was to hear the bullets banging and seek refuge to save my own life. Many spoke of God but I did not understand, because my family never exposed me to religion. In my daily life as an adult, I learned to love God being in the United States in 1983, thanks to a family that evangelized my husband and I, which meant to be able to marry the man that I have shared my life with since those hard years have passed. Since then, we have had a great devotion for Monsignor Romero and we began to organize masses every anniversary of his death, on March 24, in the churches we have attended. I always asked God that one day Monsignor Romero would become a Saint because he had the courage to be the voice of the voiceless in my home country, El Salvador.

Life has not been easy but I thank God for this beautiful country that welcomed me and allowed me to excel in and form a beautiful family. Now in this country, we live in difficult times that are sad for us immigrants because, even being an American citizen, I feel the pain of my Latino brothers and sisters, because of so many unjust laws that make no sense are at the whim of humans.

But, in comparison to where we were living, this is still a paradise where I feel free to go somewhere and share, without listening to bullets at every moment. Every day I ask God to find more people like Monsignor Romero, who is now my Holy Romero of the Americas, to have the courage to defend the most disadvantaged and voiceless.

With the little I can be, I try to be the voice of those without a voice just as Santo Romero taught me, helping the elderly in the nursing homes in Boston, especially those who do not know how to defend themselves in the English language.