Jose Maria Tojeira
Jose Maria Tojeira, S.J., in an undated photo. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

On the morning of Nov. 16, 1989, José María Tojeira, S.J., received an unexpected visitor at his home in San Salvador. “While 1 was shaving, around 6:30 a.m., after the curfew was lifted, the husband of Elba Ramos, Obdulio, came to the provincial house two blocks away and told me what had happened,” Tojeira told America in a 1995 interview. 

Obdulio Ramos’s news could not have been worse. Earlier that night, armed men had entered the Jesuit residence at the University of Central America in San Salvador and murdered Ramos’s wife and daughter, along with six Jesuit priests. Tojeira, the Jesuit provincial of El Salvador at the time, went immediately to the residence at the UCA, finding there the bodies of all eight victims. Despite disinformation attempts by the Salvadoran government, it soon became clear that they had all been murdered by the Salvadoran army, then waging a vicious war against rebel forces; the government insisted the rebels were aligned with and assisted by the Jesuits whose bodies were now strewn about the lawn of the residence.

That moment—along with the momentous events that followed in the years to come—was perhaps the most shocking and agonizing in the long life and ministry of Father Tojeira, who died in Guatemala City on Sept. 5, 2025, at the age of 78. But he would see much more—times of hope and of despair—in the 36 years that followed.

The afternoon after the killings of Ignacio Ellacuría, S.J., Ignacio Martín-Baró, S.J., Segundo Montes, S.J., Juan Ramón Moreno, S.J., Joaquín López y López, S.J., Amando López, S.J., Elba Ramos and Celina Ramos, Father Tojeira spoke in the chapel of the UCA. “The Society of Jesus does not want vengeance for these murders,” he told reporters, “but we do want justice.” While true justice may never have been achieved—the men truly responsible for ordering the murders were never held accountable—one could argue that the end of El Salvador’s civil war came about as a direct consequence of the martyrdom of the UCA Jesuits and their companions.

Why? Because much of the Salvadoran military’s funding, training and equipment was provided by the U.S. government. Outrage over the killings (and the political reality that upward of 10 percent of the U.S. House of Representatives had attended a Jesuit high school or university in the United States) meant that such funding—including training in “counterinsurgency” at places like Fort Benning in Georgia—came under intense scrutiny; further, the degree of power which the Salvadoran military held over civil society in El Salvador became increasingly clear. In May of the following year, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to cut military aid to El Salvador by half. Representative Joe Moakley, a Democrat from Massachusetts, said that day: 

Those who pulled the trigger and committed this heinous crime included men trained with American money, by American servicemen, on American soil. American taxpayer money for 10 years now has not been used to build peace with democracy—but to destroy hope and build the private bank accounts of those who get rich at the expense of the Salvadoran people and the American people. This must end, and it must end now.

It took a while, but the war did finally end in 1992 with the signing of the Chapultepec Peace Accords in Mexico City. Father Tojeira was instrumental in pursuing justice for the slain and calling Salvadoran government officials to account during the legal and political wrangling that preceded (and followed) the signing of the peace accords.

Father Tojeira, known as “Chema,” was born in Vigo, Spain, in 1947, and entered the Society of Jesus after high school. Though he studied philosophy and theology in Madrid, he spent almost his entire ministry in Central America. After serving in Honduras as a parish priest, the director of Radio Progreso and a founder of a Jesuit social research center, he moved to El Salvador in 1985 to serve as superior of the Jesuit theologate at the UCA. 

In 1988, he was named the provincial of the Central American Province of the Society of Jesus, serving the people of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama.

In 1997, Tojeira was appointed the rector/president of the UCA (a position that Ignacio Ellacuria, S.J., one of the martyred Jesuits, had also held), serving in that role for 13 years. In addition to numerous articles on ethics, politics and theology, he also authored such books as El martirio ayer y hoy: testimonio radical de fe y justicia, Esperanzas y temores desde Centroamérica,  Los hicaques de Yoro and Tipping the Scales of Justice: Perspective on El Salvador.

He later worked as the director of the Human Rights Institute at the university from 2016 to 2020. From 2021 until his death, he served as a parish priest in El Salvador, continuing pastoral work alongside public advocacy and commentary on church and social affairs. The last few years of his life proved increasingly eventful as well, as he often served as a spokesperson for the Central American Province of the Society of Jesus during attempts by the government of Nicaragua to silence the local Jesuits, seize their property and cover up human rights abuses.

Father Tojeira died on Sept. 5, 2025, while on a trip to Guatemala City. Just last year, he preached at the 35th anniversary Mass for the martyrs of the UCA (translated here from the original Spanish by the Ignatian Solidarity Network). He said:

What remains for us is to take comfort in faith, to rely on our mutual witness, and to be witnesses of the Living Word. Evil can overcome good, but it cannot replace good with evil for long. Our faith, as the martyrs show us, is like a powerful spring that, no matter how much we are crushed, returns us to the level of peaceful struggle for the Kingdom of good, justice, and love. To celebrate the martyrs—who gave their lives for Jesus and for the face of Jesus reflected in the poor and persecuted—is to festively anticipate the resurrection and the final triumph of the brotherhood of the Kingdom of God. 

After his death, the UCA republished a 2015 video profile of his life and ministry.

“I am heartbroken by the passing of my dear friend, Father José María ‘Chema’ Tojeira,” Congressman Jim McGovern of Massachusetts said in a statement after Tojeira’s death. (McGovern had been an outspoken advocate against U.S. military aid to El Salvador after the 1989 killings.) “He was one of my heroes. A man of profound faith, courage, and conviction, Father Tojeira devoted his life to championing human rights, justice, and the dignity of the poor and oppressed.”

In a 2022 interview with Spanish Jesuits, Father Tojeira offered a kind of eulogy of his own: “I’m content with life and with all that I have lived; I feel joy in it, consolation…. I’m content. I also understand my faults and problems, but off we go, always trusting in the mercy of God.”

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Our poetry selection for this week is “Question,” by Dierdre Lockwood. Readers can view all of America’s published poems here.

In this space every week, America features reviews of and literary commentary on one particular writer or group of writers (both new and old; our archives span more than a century), as well as poetry and other offerings from America Media. We hope this will give us a chance to provide you with more in-depth coverage of our literary offerings. It also allows us to alert digital subscribers to some of our online content that doesn’t make it into our newsletters.

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Happy reading!

James T. Keane

Editor’s note: A previous version of this article stated that Father Tojeira had a doctorate in theology from Universidad Pontificia Comillas in Madrid, where he instead earned his licentiate.

James T. Keane is a Senior Editor at America.