Samuel Ruiz

Samuel Ruiz García was a Mexican Catholic prelate who served as bishop of the Diocese of San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, from 1959 until 1999. Ruiz is best known for his role as mediator during the conflict between the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) and the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), a Mexican political party which had held power for over seventy years, and whose policies were often disadvantageous to the indigenous populations of Chiapas. Inspired by Liberation Theology, which swept through the Catholic Church in Latin America after the 1960s, Ruiz's diocese helped some hundreds of thousands of indigenous Maya people in Chiapas who were among Mexico's poorest marginalized communities.

3 November 1924

Born on the same birth date (3 November 1924): Marc Breaux

Born on the same birth day (3 November): Albert Goldthorpe • Alfonso Orueta • Antonia Thomas • Brian Robinson (cyclist) • David Armstrong-Jones, 2nd Earl of Snowdon • Greg Plitt • Harrison McCain • Helmuth Koinigg • Janel McCarville • Jesús Blasco • Larry Herndon • Larry Holmes • Michael Hofmann (footballer, born 1972) • Mick Thomson • Odvar Nordli • Siiri Oviir • Tariq Abdul-Wahad

Born in the same month (November 1924): Dmitry Yazov • Eileen Barton • Elliott Blackstone • George Segal (artist) • Gianni Ferrio • Joseph Campanella • Mel Patton • Milka Planinc • Motoo Kimura • Sybil Stockdale • Takaaki Yoshimoto