Camilo Torres Restrepo

Who was Camilo Torres Restrepo?

Father Camilo Torres Restrepo was a Colombian socialist, Roman Catholic priest, a predecessor of liberation theology and a member of the National Liberation Army guerrilla organisation. During his life, he tried to reconcile revolutionary Marxism and Catholicism.

As part of the academic staff of the National University of Colombia, he was a co-founder of the Sociology Faculty together with Orlando Fals Borda in 1960. His involvement in several student and political movements during the time won him a large following as well as many detractors, specially from the Colombian government and the church itself. Due to the growing pressure to back down from his radical politics, Camilo Torres saw himself persecuted and went into hiding by joining the guerrillas in Colombia. He served as a low-ranking member of the ELN to whom he also provided spiritual assistance and inspiration from a Marxist-Christian point of view. He was killed in his first combat experience, when the ELN ambushed a Colombian Military patrol. After his death, Camilo Torres was made an official martyr of the ELN.