The researcher and exiled lawyer, Martha Patricia Molina, reported that the whereabouts of the Poor Clare nuns are unknown after they were evicted from the monasteries on the night of Wednesday, January 28.
According to Molina, the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega informed the nuns of their immediate eviction from the properties where they lived, as well as the confiscation of their belongings. The Poor Clare nuns had monasteries in León, Chinandega, Managua, and Granada.
«They were only allowed to take a few belongings, whatever they could carry in their hands. Most of the nuns are Nicaraguan. Their whereabouts are unknown,» Molina wrote on Twitter, who has documented the attacks against the Catholic Church since 2018 in her report Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church.
Poor Clare nuns have not abandoned the country voluntarily
Molina denied that the Poor Clare nuns had completed their mission in Nicaragua, as the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega might suggest, which has expelled hundreds of religious figures from the country. «No religious person abandons their mission in Nicaragua voluntarily, but rather due to religious persecution,» said the lawyer.
The Franciscan Poor Clare Sisters Association was legally established in Nicaragua in February 2004, but on May 19, 2023, it was arbitrarily canceled, along with other nonprofit organizations linked to the Church.
Last week, it was also revealed that the «Discalced Carmelite» order had to abandon its mission and the country, as has happened with other religious orders.
Matagalpa curia looted by the Police
Hours before the expulsion of the Poor Clare nuns, trucks from the Sandinista police and the local government were removing goods from the Archiepiscopal Curia of Matagalpa, a property that had been occupied by the Ortega police.
The Archiepiscopal Curia of Matagalpa was the place from which Bishop Rolando Álvarez was taken by the police in August 2022, after days of siege. He was then imprisoned for over a year, until his exile to Rome along with other religious figures in January 2024.
Ortega at war with the Catholic Church
In Nicaragua, the Ortega dictatorship and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, accuse the Catholic Church of having supported the 2018 protests, which Ortega described as an attempt at a «coup d’état.»
In recent years, the Ortega-Murillo regime has intensified its attacks against the Catholic Church, imprisoning priests and prohibiting all religious activities outside of churches.
It has also canceled numerous social organizations, charitable initiatives, Catholic Church-run shelters, academic centers, Catholic-oriented media outlets, and expelled nuns and priests from the country, among other actions.
