Oscar Romero Quotes

Martyrdom does not end something. It is only the beginning.

To those who had ordered them to death, one of them said: “We die because the people are asleep and you will die because the people will awaken.”

If God accepts the sacrifice of my life, may my death be for the freedom of my people. A bishop will die, but the Church of God, which is the people, will never perish. I do not believe in death without resurrection. If they kill me, I will rise again in the people of El Salvador.

I am a revolutionary; my life is dedicated to freeing the people.

It's got to be the ballot or the bullet. The ballot or the bullet. If you're afraid to use an expression like that, you should get back in the cotton patch, you should get back in the alley.

You can jail a Revolutionary, but you can't jail the Revolution.

There's nothing automatic about political change, about liberation.

The only thing that's going to free Huey is gun powder.

Agitate! Agitate! Ought to be the motto of every reformer. Agitation is the opposite of stagnation - the one is life, the other death.

Organizations don’t make revolutions. People do.

Organize! Educate! Agitate!

History teaches us that the great revolutions aren’t started by people who are utterly down and out, without hope and vision. They take place when people begin to live a little better—and when they see how much yet remains to be achieved.

They will only kill me, but I will return and it will be in the millions

It is repression that creates the revolutionary spirit of freedom.

When people start to complain, "Voting doesn't matter," I'm like, the people of Wisconsin weren't boycotting and hitting the streets and blowing up those rooms because voting didn't change those situations for them. That was their livelihood. There's revolution going on all over the world because they actually can't have a voice.

I don't believe people die. They just go uptown. To Bloomingdales. They just take longer to get back.

A revolution without dancing is not a revolution worth having.

I would love to believe that when I die I will live again, that some thinking, feeling, remembering part of me will continue. But as much as I want to believe that, and despite the ancient and worldwide cultural traditions that assert an afterlife, I know of nothing to suggest that it is more than wishful thinking.

The lyrics stand today (1980). They're still my feeling about politics. I want to see the plan. I want to know what you're going to do after you've knocked it all down. I mean, can't we use some of it? What's the point of bombing Wall Street? If you want to change the system, change the system. It's no good shooting people.

It is the dictate of history to bring to the fore the kind of leaders who seize the moment, who cohere the wishes and aspirations of the oppressed. Such was Steve Biko, a fitting product of his time; a proud representative of the re-awakening of a people.

If 180 million people want to be undead, that’s their funeral, but I happen to like being alive.

Che Guevara taught us we could dare to have confidence in ourselves, confidence in our abilities. He instilled in us the conviction that struggle is our only recourse. He, was a citizen of the free world that together we are in the process of building. That is why we say that Che Guevara is also African and Burkinabè.

It does not do to rely too much on silent majorities, Evey, for silence is a fragile thing, one loud noise, and its gone. But the people are so cowed and disorganised. A few might take the opportunity to protest, but it'll just be a voice crying in the wilderness. Noise is relative to the silence preceding it. The more absolute the hush, the more shocking the thunderclap. Our masters have not heard the people's voice for generations, Evey and it is much, much louder than they care to remember.

You can Jail a Revolutionary but you can't jail the Revolution. You can run a freedom fighter around the country, but you can't run freedom fighting around the country. You can murder a liberator, but you can't murder liberation.

People need to dance. I'd say dance at least twice a day. That's how to get your energy up and how you keep you revolutionary spirit going. It's Emma Goldman who said, "Any revolution where I can't dance is not my revolution." I think that's the revolution we want.