Camilo Torres Restrepo

Camilo Torres Restrepo ( born February 3, 1929 in Bogotá, † February 15, 1966 in San Vicente de Chucuri in Santander) was a Colombian, a Catholic priest and liberation theologian. He was an active member of the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN - National Liberation Army ), the first South American guerrilla movement that had active Christians in their units.

Life and work

Camilo Torres came from one of the richest families in Colombia. He was born the son of a former dean of the medical faculty and temporary Rector of the State University of Colombia. As a child he moved to Germany, where his father was Colombian consul in Berlin was and later attended the German School in Bogotá. After he had gained the baccalaureate, he studied law and became engaged. In retreat, he decided to become a priest, however, and studied philosophy and Catholic theology. In 1954 he was ordained a priest. On the recommendation of Cardinal Luque of Bogotá he could connect a degree in Sociology at the Catholic University in Leuven, where his social ideas were decisively shaped.

After a temporary job as a social worker and counselor in West Berlin Torres returned to Bogota back in 1959. He was chaplain at the National University and co-founder of the local sociological faculty, where he worked as a lecturer.

Torres began increasingly to see the poverty of the people as a major problem and advocated for cooperation between Christians and Marxists. He himself said: ". Why should argue whether the soul is mortal or immortal, when we both know that hunger is deadly we " Since 1965, he became increasingly known in Colombia as he began to spread his socialist revolutionary ideas and use for striking students. Since Torres, contrary to the orders of his archbishop, Cardinal Concha continued his political activities, he was suspended in his priestly functions; his university offices he had to resign.

For several months he traveled the country to promote his "Christian- communist movement " and organize. He won a large following especially among the academic youth and was seen by many as a potential leader of the left-wing opposition to the National Front. Prior to the elections of 1966 Torres founded the Frente Unido ( United Front ) - an association of almost the entire left side of the country.

On March 17, 1965 Torres released his basic program of the united front. In October 1965, he joined together with a student troupe of the National Liberation Front of Communist-inspired Ejercito de Liberación Nacional (ELN ), and went into the ground. After months of disappearance he enlisted on 7 January 1966 as spokesman for one of their armed groups with a " Proclamation to the Colombian people " from the mountains one last time to publicly speak. On February 15, 1966 Torres was killed in the village of El Carmen near Santander in his first battle with the Colombian army by government forces. A Christian burial was denied. His tomb is still unknown.

Memory

Daniel Viglietti has put it in his song Cruz de luz, which has become known by Víctor Jara, a monument. His story was made ​​into a film in 1977 The death of Camilo Torres, directed by Eberhard Itzenplitz with Gerd Boeckmann in the lead role for German television.

As in 1987, the ELN and the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (MIR ) merged together, they called themselves temporarily in his memory Camilistische United National Liberation Army ( UCELN ).