In a statement issued on Friday and transmitted via video, Bishop Elías Samuel Bolaños Avelar announced the “tragic death” of Father Ricardo Antonio Cortez, Rector of San Óscar Arnulfo Romero seminary in the diocese of Zacatecoluca, Ed Salvador, Vatican News reported on August 8, 2020. He said that the Diocese’s “priests, men, and women religious and faithful…lament” his death.
At the same time, the Bishop said, “We condemn and repudiate the vile assassination that he suffered.”
The Bishop describes Father Cortez was “good, affable, dedicated to his flock and to the formation and education of the seminarians and to the members of the faithful he served.”