A priest in a container
- Alessandro Santoro, a 32 year old priest, shows me round Piagge, a
poor quarter of Florence. He puts me in touch with the base community.
Alessandro touches the heart of the people. Faces light up as he passes
by. Like a good shepherd he gives himself entirely and with all his heart
to those who society overlooks. At present, he is not concerned about being
appointed as a parish priest nor with building a church. Urgency lies elsewhere.
The visit to this part of the city reaches its high point when we meet
the gypsies. Rejected by all they found refuge underneath the motorway.
- But even there the police persecutes them.
The gypsies gather together and are pleased to welcome us. Sitting on a chair that belongs to a fortune teller I have before me these marvellous children who observe me with a naughty faces. The weather is lovely. We are feeling happy all together.
Alessandro has left his apartment in order to lend it to a young father together with his daughter. And he is using a container for shelter. Together with the base community he denounces the scandal of the 15 000 empty lodgings in Florence while at the same time many families have no access to decent housing.
- The cardinal of Florence, who received me in his prestigious palace
but which is empty of life, has come to visit Alessandro in his humble
abode.
- Perhaps he, like I, asked himself a question: "The Church is not her own self without the poor; but can she ever be the Church of the poor ?"
- Perhaps he, like I, asked himself a question: "The Church is not her own self without the poor; but can she ever be the Church of the poor ?"
