Ernesto Cardenal

NICARAGUA

(1925–2020) Ernesto Cardenal was born in Granada, Nicaragua. As a young man, he worked to overthrow Nicaraguan dictator Somoza. In 1965, he was ordained a Catholic priest. From 1965-1977 he lived in the Solentiname Islands, where he helped found the peasant artist colony which originated primitivist style painting. He was a close collaborator with the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front), and after the revolution, served as the Minister of Culture for the new government from 1979-1987. Pope John Paul II publicly chastised him in 1983 and ordered him to stop administering the sacraments. He left the FSLN in 1994, and became part of the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS). In 2019 Pope Francis Pope Francis granted him absolution from all canonical censorships. His works include Zero Hour,The Origin of Species and Other Poems, The Doubtful Straight, Psalms, and The Gospel of Solentiname.

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