Ironically, the persistence of violence is exactly why Hernandez is itching to get back to work in the mountain communities of El Salvador's Chalatenango region, where he has been assigned by the Salvadoran Lutheran Synod. The people I work with know what happened to me. We've both suffered. With more authority, I can tell them the answer is not more violence. The answer is reconciliation and forgiveness.
Reconciliation is the only way to end the violence in El Salvador, the only way.
But reconciliation in the polarized sociopolitical climate in El Salvador is easier said than done. But forgiving the neighbor next door to you is the harder part. There's a tremendous amount of distrust and pain. Such raw mistrust not only affects individuals, but it also disturbs El Salvadoran institutional life. Those institutions include churches that are no longer bound together in the common cause of seeking an end to a horrible 12-year war.