Exiled Nicaraguan clergy rally behind Pope for calling Ortega regime a "vulgar dictatorship"

Silvio José Báez Ortega, the auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of Managua, cheered Pope Francis' description of Daniel Ortega's Nicaraguan government as a "vulgar dictatorship."

"Today he (Pope) has told them what they are: a dictatorship of unbalanced, vulgar and anachronistic, in the Hitlerian and communist style," tweeted the influential bishop, who left Nicaragua four years ago for the U.S. after Pope Francis determined he was in danger.

"I do not think this is the first time that (the Pope) has seen it (the Ortega regime) like this, and it is not too late to say it," added the hierarch, who on Feb. 15 became the second member of the Episcopal Conference to be exiled from Nicaragua. 

The first clergy member to have their citizenship revoked by the Ortega regime was Monsignor Rolando Álvarez, bishop of the diocese of Matagalpa and apostolic administrator of the diocese of Estelí, from northern Nicaragua.

One month ago he was sentenced to more than 26 years in prison for crimes considered "treason against the homeland" only a day after refusing to be exiled by the Ortega government to the United States.

Álvarez was sentenced and transferred from house arrest to the Modelo prison, after refusing to get on the plane that would have transported him and 222 other released Nicaraguan political prisoners, to the U.S.

The Pope said the decision to imprison Álvarez suggested the Nicaraguan regime was making "imbalanced" decisions. 

"Here, we have a bishop in prison, a very serious, very capable man. He wanted to give his testimony and refuse exile," Pope Francis said in an interview with Infobae from Vatican City. 

Other clergy members rallied behind the Pope and their colleagues who have been brave enough to take a stand for human rights. 

"Today Nero and Agrippina burn with these words of the Holy Father, with which we must refer to the (Nicaraguan) regime: unbalanced, communist and Hitlerian, harking from the 1930s," said Nicaraguan priest Uriel Vallejos.

"Men of God are being exiled, imprisoned and assassinated because they are sending a message denouncing the injustices of the powerful. You cannot be right with [both] God and the devil," wrote Edwing Román, another Nicaraguan priest in exile wrote on Twitter.

On Feb. 21, Ortega described the Church as a "mafia" and accused it of being undemocratic for not allowing Catholics to elect the Pope, cardinals, bishops and priests by direct vote.

Pope Francis fired back the Ortega regime in Nicaragua as a "vulgar dictatorship," a month after the sentence of Bishop Álvarez to 26 years and 4 months in prison, according to an interview published this Friday.