With a Shepherd’s Heart. Costa Rica. Saint Ezequiel Moreno. July 2024.

On July 23, at the Saint Ezekiel Moreno Seminary in Pozos de Santa Ana, the Tomás Moro Institute of Costa Rica presented a new selection and edition of pastoral letters by the Recollect saint dedicated to promoting the gospel in the face of the radical liberalism of his time.

At seven o’clock in the evening on July 23, the San Ezekiel Moreno Postulancy of the Augustinian Recollects in Pozos de Santa Ana (San José, Costa Rica) was the venue for the presenting a new selection of pastoral letters by St. Ezekiel Moreno (1848-1906), an Augustinian Recollect, bishop, and protector of cancer patients.

At the event’s presidential table was the bishop emeritus of Alajuela, the Augustinian Recollect Ángel San Casimiro, and Luis Fernando Calvo, executive director of the Tomás Moro Institute, founder of the Association of Heroic Options and specialist in political studies, business administration, and theological sciences.

The volume is a selection of pastoral letters from the Recollect saint, with a prologue by Luis Fernando Calvo himself. Given the interests of the Tomás Moro Institute and the prologue, the selection’s main thematic focus is the confrontation that Saint Ezekiel had as bishop of Pasto (1895-1906) with radical liberalism in Colombia and Ecuador.

The Diocese of Saint Ezekiel is a neighbor of Ecuador, one of South America’s “hot frontiers” for a good part of the 19th century. In Ecuador, radical liberalism committed some of the most severe acts of violence, such as the murders of the archbishop of Quito and the rector of San Felipe Neri and the frequent attacks on temples.

Saint Ezekiel condemned and denounced the attacks, reminded Catholics of the doctrinal points that liberal theories confronted with the Gospel, promoted the reconstruction of the Sanctuary of Our Lady of the Rosary of Las Lajas (Nariño), and for this reason, earned the hatred of radical liberals and even caused tensions with other bishops that the Holy See settled.

The Tomás Moro Institute is a center of political and social thought of Christian inspiration, of a humanistic character, dedicated to the achievement of the common good and that seeks to participate in social dialogue according to the criteria and auspices of the Social Doctrine of the Church, “for the creation of more just, orderly societies and tending to the achievement and conservation of the common good,” as indicated on its website.

Among the values that it claims to promote are kindness, humility, perseverance, and a job well done. For this Institute, Saint Ezekiel Moreno is an example of someone who knew how to illuminate his time’s political and social reality from faith in challenging times of confrontation and persecution of the Church by liberal governments.

According to the author of the selection and prologue, the book is titled With a Shepherd’s Heart “because Saint Ezekiel, without being a politician or ideologist, simply out of love for his faithful, reviews a series of dangers and errors of liberal ideology. (…) As he distills these ideas, he also provides us with a series of ideas about the care we should take with ideologies since ideologies can, to a greater or lesser degree, be contrary to the faith.”

According to the director of the Tomás Moro Institute of Costa Rica, “In times when we see the advance of secularism, the example of Saint Ezekiel motivates us to be wise and courageous.”