The Romero Lecture ‘Responding to the Cry of the Poor Today’ is a talk being toured across the UK by the Romero Trust to raise awareness and celebrate the life and work of Archbishop Oscar Romero and support social justice in America and across the world.

The lecture will be held on Tuesday 21 March between 7.00 and 9.00pm at Leeds Trinity University in Horsforth, Leeds. This is one of the few being toured and hosted in the north of England.

The lecture will be given by Peggy Healy, a former nurse and Maryknoll Sister who directly worked in Central America during the Salvadoran civil war in the 1980s and who has been involved in human rights works in Central America.

Peggy received her law degree from Fordham University where she became the Program Director in International Human Rights. She also worked as a Senior Consultant both at the Global Diversity Practice at Towers Perrin and at the Future Work Institute. She has extensive experience as a human rights consultant to multiple non-profit and nongovernmental organisations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America promoting advocacy strategies designed to involve citizens, particularly young people and vulnerable sectors of the population, in social change.

Peggy’s lecture will focus on justice and peace in society as well as celebrate the work of Oscar Romero, the Archbishop of San Salvador, who was assassinated in the 1980s as he was celebrating Mass in the chapel of the Divine Providence cancer hospital where he lived. He was targeted out of hatred and for his work with the less fortunate people in his community.

Decades later he was declared a martyr of the Church and in 2018 he was officially recognised as Saint Oscar Romero for the work he did to help others.

This lecture is part of a programme of work led by the University’s recently appointed Director of Catholic Mission, Dr Ann Marie Mealey. The aim is to support the Leeds Trinity University Strategic Plan and promote the principles of dignity, respect, social justice, equality and inclusion.

The event is open to members of the public and free to attend. The lecture is part a national speaking tour organised by the Romero Trust and facilitated in the Leeds Diocese by the Justice & Peace Commission working in partnership with Leeds Trinity University.

Sir John Battle, Chair of the Justice and Peace Commission, said: "Increasingly the cry of the poor in all corners of our world is drowned out, dismissed, or ignored. St Oscar Romero is our contemporary reminder that like him we must follow Christ's example of working to be with them in every context."

Dr Ann Marie Mealey, the Director of Catholic Mission at Leeds Trinity University, said: “Leeds Trinity is proud to host this event as it helps us to live our mission and values and engage more fully with how faith involves action for social justice and any person who is marginalised or vulnerable in our community.”

For more information visit the event page.