Inspired by the Sandinista victory of 1979, artists from all over Latin America, Europe and North America came to Nicaragua in the 1980s and filled the newly liberated Central American country's public spaces with murals. As in previous Latin American revolutions, such as in Mexico, Cuba and Chile, the murals they painted depicted socialist themes of free health care and education, struggles against poverty and corruption, Spanish colonialism and U.S. imperialism. The Sandinista murals, however, were unique in that they often incorporated religious themes, and were the world's first socialist revolutionary murals to be painted in churches.

While throughout Managua and other Nicaraguan cities artists and priests collaborated to create murals on and within several Catholic churches, one church in particular stands apart from the rest as the most complete fusion of art, Catholicism and socialism. As the only church filled from floor to ceiling and front to back with one continuous series of paintings, sculpture and mosaic, the Franciscan church of Santa María de los Ángeles, located in the working class neighborhood of Barrio Riguero, Managua, is the most extraordinary example of the uniquely Nicaraguan fusion of religious and revolutionary themes.

The interior of Santa María de los Ángeles was completed over a three-year period, from 1982 to 1985, as a practical lesson in the plastic arts by the Mural School of Managua. The work fully incorporates all the three-dimensional arts, including painting, sculpture, ceramics, and architecture, to the point where the entire church itself is one, multi-dimensional piece of art.

Equally as impressive as the church's successful integration of the plastic arts is the subject matter of the work, which follows the Franciscan tradition of using paintings to depict the story of the gospel. In the case of Santa María de los Ángeles, however, the paintings depict the history of Nicaragua, beginning with pre-Columbian peoples and gods (making it quite possibly the only Catholic church in the world to house statues of pagan gods), through the indigenous resistance to Spanish conquest, General Sandino's resistance to U.S. imperialism, Carlos Fonseca's victorious Sandinista Revolution, and culminating in a breathtaking 500 square foot mural depicting the future resurrection of a mestizo Christ in a free Nicaragua.

Designated twice as national patrimony by the national assembly, the church of Santa María de los Ángeles is truly a unique and priceless treasure of immeasurable cultural significance to the people of Nicaragua . Sadly, however, it appears this work of art may be destined to the same tragic fate as hundreds of other murals from the Sandinista period.

Upon the peaceful defeat of the Sandinistas at the ballot box in 1990, the new pro-U.S. national government and fascist Managua mayor immediately embarked upon a ruthless campaign of vandalizing and erasing the country's hundreds of murals. As part of a larger campaign to erase the memory of the revolution from the entire national consciousness, successive post-Sandinista, neo-liberal governments have painted over nearly ever mural in the country.

Today in 2006, the only murals left in Managua are those protected behind closed doors. In the case of Santa María de los Ángeles, "author's rights" laws have protected the murals over the 16 years since the Sandinista defeat. The current priest's distaste for the political message behind the murals, manifested through his obnoxious habit covering the murals with curtains and posters, has apparently won the sympathy of Managua's current city government. The mayor, who ironically is a Sandinista, is funding a project, currently underway, to replace the church roof.

After having already removed the old roof, causing considerable damage to the artwork in the process, the roofing company decided as an afterthought to call the murals' lead artist, Sergio Michilini, to ask if there might be a problem with them permanently removing part of the mural, since the wooden ceiling panels it was painted on were to be replaced with a cheap plastic laminate. Within ten minutes Michilini was at the church assessing the damage and planning the restoration of what had not yet been destroyed. After several unanswered pleas to the church and the city government for the protection of the priceless artwork, Michilini and the Nicaragua art community are preparing themselves for the unimaginable: the destruction of the church's artwork.

Sadly, the story is too familiar in present-day Nicaragua. Politicians and government officials are willing to throw away historic national patrimony because it no longer compliments today's political values. Michilini asks the question, "In Italy, would they delete the works of Michelangelo just because the current government disagrees with his political views?" The murals of Santa María de los Ángeles are Nicaragua's history and culture. They come from a very real and unique period in Nicaragua's recent past -- as unique as the murals themselves -- which cannot be erased.