Torture victim Lucho thanks Galway for saving his life

It’s a long way from Santiago, Chile, to Baile na hAbhainn in Connemara, and it’s a long way from practising medicine to creating icons for religious orders here in Ireland, but Luis Avarez, better known to his friends as Lucho, has had a more extraordinary life than most people.

Lucho, who was commissioned by the Poor Clare order in Galway last year to create a new icon for its Nuns’ Island church to mark the Year of the Holy Name of Jesus, was a qualified medic in his homeland of Chile until 1984. Then he drew the ire of the right-wing Pinochet dictatorship and everything changed totally.

He could easily be bitter at how he was treated but he chose not to be. Instead, he embraced a new life here in Ireland, where his Catholic faith is hugely important to him.

Last Friday, his happiness was visible as he presented the icon at the altar of the Poor Clare chapel in Nuns’ Island to mark the beginning of a year-long drive by the Poor Clares and Franciscans to foster a renewed devotion to the Holy Name of Jesus. The Poor Clares and the Franciscans have been interlinked since St Clare became one of St Francis’s earliest followers in Italy in the 13th century.

This current initiative has its roots in events 100 years ago when a Franciscan priest, Fr Francis Donnelly gave a retreat to the Poor Clare sisters in Galway on the theme of the Holy name of Jesus and was so impressed by their response, that he began a campaign along the West coast from Galway to Cork fostering devotion to Jesus.

The sisters here in Galway decided to mark that centenary this year and the celebration began last Friday with a special Mass for the public, concelebrated by Franciscans from Ireland and further afield.

Afterwards, the nuns hosted a party, where Lucho’s icon was the subject of much praise and discussion.  That he was responsible for its creation in the first place demonstrates his ability to survive and adapt in the most adverse circumstances.

In the early 1980s, in Chile, Lucho’s actions in highlighting torture nearly caused his death, but friends from Ireland came to his rescue.

Lucho had trained as a doctor in Chile and furthered his studies in Paris. It was in Paris, in 1981, that he befriended a member of the Corbett family from Galway city and he credits that friendship with subsequently saving his life. 

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.