When Men Are Boys.

2013.01.17 When Men Are Boys
I didn’t mean to become an adult who plays video games but it happened. I think video games all have tremendous capacity to be art even if the vast majority of them are a commercial product first, art second (video games are, after all, a $67 billion industry).
I’ve played the first Dead Island and there’s plenty of fun scares in the all-out zombie mayhem. It’s also impossible to miss the digital “bikini babes” everywhere. Sure, 99% of them are grotesque walking corpses who want to give my character a masticated makeover but

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El Salvador Day 02: Two Red Books on Holy Ground, the High Price of Immigration, and Meeting Jon Sobrino

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Today was a full day, an emotional day. Here’s the scoop, dear reader…

You know what’s weird? Hearing someone proclaim your native country to be an “imperial nation” to your face.

That’s what happened yesterday during our history of El Salvador presentation yesterday as Carlos explained how the US government has been culpable in Salvadorian oppression for decades and we heard a similar thought, in different words, today during our presentation from another man named Carlos who explained the two major problems in El Salvador, economics and violence. But let me step back for a moment because we witnessed profound images before we listened to this story.

The Red Books

Our first stop was at the University of Central America where we traveled through a museum dedicated to the martyrdom of six Jesuit priests and two women who were executed in 1989. I encourage you to read about the full story on another website, as in the meantime I want to talk about the emotions involved in seeing this museum. First, the museum was located in the offices of the Jesuit priests, meaning we learned of their lives in what was once the space where they worked their message. There were photos on the wall showing the firebombing the soldiers did to the offices, bringing home what this space once was. We saw clothing and items belonging to Rutullio Grande and Romero, plus the actual clothing the Jesuits wore as they were executed. Bullet holes were like  pockmarks across the fabrics and stains of blood and other bodily fluids from the assassination that night are still clearly visible in each garment. Combined with bullet-riddled Bibles, torched paintings of Romero, and photos of the two women who were also killed, the museum was a haunting tribute to their lives.

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