By , Evangelical Focus. (photo: Konrad Hoffman/Unsplash)
In an act of reconciliation, reparation and truth, the Colombian Attorney General’s Office symbolically returned the bodies of eight Christian leaders who were murdered and buried in a mass grave in a rural area of the municipality of Calamar in the department of Guaviare.
The event was held in the Legal Medicine auditorium in the city of Villavicencio, in the department of Meta, and was presided by the Guaviare sectional director, the case prosecutor and a specialised prosecutor, as well as psychology officials from the Technical Investigation Corps (CTI).
During the ceremony, they handed over documents and certificates of full identification of the bodies, and described the procedure for the location and recovery of the bodies.
The victims were identified as Jesús and Carlos Valero, Marivel Silva, Maryuri Hernández, Isaid Gómez, Óscar Hernández, Nixon Peñaloza Chacón and James Caicedo.
Religious and social leaders
The victims were “from peasant families who preached the gospel in community spaces rather than in large churches, but who were strong leaders within their own communities”, stated the Attorney General’s Office.
The eight of them were members of the Evangelical Alliance of Colombia (DEAC) and the evangelical movement of the Foursquare Church (ICCG).
They were not only spiritual leaders, but also social leaders who developed community support projects.