Almost four centuries with its people
The Blood of Christ is a 17th-century polychrome wood carving by an unknown artist. According to Church records, it arrived in Nicaragua from Guatemala in 1638: in 2020 it had been here 382 years.
In Managua it had seven homes: the churches of Veracruz, San Miguel, San Sebastián, San Antonio, Monte Tabor, Pius X and the Cathedral. The first was Veracruz, where Parque Darío stands today, and there people called it the “Lord of Miracles.” It survived four earthquakes; in 1931, on Holy Tuesday, it was the only thing saved from the church of San Antonio.
Tradition credits it with stopping a cholera epidemic in the mid-19th century. In 1993 Cardinal Obando brought it to the new Cathedral, and in 1996 Pope John Paul II prayed before it.
It was never an image kept out of sight. Every year it was taken down from its altar, and people came to the lowering with palms and pacaya flowers; fourteen girls carried the cushions it was laid on, and it was cleaned with perfumed cotton. It was watched over until midnight with coffee, rosquillas and sweet bread, and at dawn a solemn Mass was sung among fireworks. Its great procession was in July, and later it had another on Holy Wednesday.
Its devotees left it thousands of gold ex-votos, and some bequeathed it houses and land: it came to own cattle ranches. In the Cathedral, William Pérez, for years the head of the Knights of the Blood of Christ, watched people come to fulfill their vows: young men who had survived a stabbing or a gunshot, and mothers with their newborns giving thanks for a safe birth. Monsignor Silvio Fonseca called it “the heritage of a whole national history.”
Sources: Despacho 505, Catholic.net, La Prensa, La Prensa (2002), La Prensa Domingo
What Pope Francis said
Two days after the attack, on Sunday, August 2, 2020, Pope Francis named the image from the window of the Apostolic Palace, at the end of the Angelus, before the whole world:
«I am thinking of the people of Nicaragua who are suffering because of the attack in the Cathedral of Managua, where an image of Christ that is highly venerated, that has accompanied and sustained the life of the faithful people for centuries, was greatly damaged, almost destroyed. Dear brothers and sisters in Nicaragua, I am near you and am praying for you.»
The faith of its people
Managua did not only visit it in its chapel: people walked with it in the streets, and kept doing so when that began to carry a cost.
Every Good Friday
The penitential Way of the Cross with the Blood of Christ left the Colegio Teresiano at 8 a.m. and went down the Carretera a Masaya to the Cathedral.
Artículo 66October 2018
In the middle of the government’s campaign against Bishop Silvio Báez, after a Mass in support of him, the faithful left crosses in the Cathedral courtyard bearing the names of that year’s dead. Earlier, citizen protesters had placed them at the Jean Paul Genie roundabout, and Sandinista supporters tore them down and destroyed them.
100% NoticiasGood Friday 2019
Mothers and relatives of those killed in 2018 carried wooden crosses in the Way of the Cross. When the procession ended, the Police attacked the faithful.
La PrensaApril 15, 2022
After two years suspended by the pandemic, a huge Way of the Cross carried the painting of Christ and its burned face. It was about a kilometer shorter: it started near the Hotel Hilton and reached the Cathedral at midday.
La PrensaJuly 9, 2023
With processions banned from the streets, more than a thousand faithful venerated it in the Cathedral gardens. Father Said Ruiz said the image “will not go out through the streets.”
La PrensaGood Friday 2025
The Way of the Cross was held inside the Cathedral grounds, with police patrols watching it from inside.
La Prensa
Seeing the burned image, a Nicaraguan priest recalled the prophet Isaiah:
«“His visage be inglorious among men” … “a man of sorrows”.»
Isaiah 52:14; 53:3 (Douay-Rheims)
What happened
July 31, 2020, around 11:00 a.m.
A hooded man throws a Molotov cocktail into the Blood of Christ chapel. The crucifix is completely charred, and consecrated hosts burn as well.
Read the articleAugust 2, 2020
Pope Francis speaks of Nicaragua at the Angelus. That same day the Bishops’ Conference condemns the attack as a planned act of terrorism.
Read the articleAugust 2020
The Police rule out that it was intentional. Nuncio Waldemar Sommertag calls for a serious, careful and transparent investigation.
Read the articleFebruary 2024
Reports say a restoration of the image in Guatemala is being prepared. There is no public confirmation that it took place.
Read the articleJune 30, 2025
The charred face, kept in a glass urn, is placed back in the Cathedral on its feast day.
Read the articleJuly 31, 2025
Five years later, the chapel walls are still blackened and the chapel remains closed.
Read the article
