On March 11 in the Plaza de Luján at 5:00 p.m., the Homes of Christ They finish their journey in these 15 years that are celebrating life throughout the country, touring the centers that are dedicated to addressing addictions, taking care of the most discarded. We are going to celebrate with a big party, with all the people, in Luján. And also celebrate the 10 years of Pope Francis. We are going to unite it because in their history they are united.
The first neighborhood center was created with an initial kick given by the then Bishop of Buenos Aires, Monsignor Bergoglio, who habituated the peripheries of the City of Buenos Aires to better understand it. It was not that he stood in the center of the city or in the most famous place, but that He knew the outskirts, the villas, the popular neighborhoods in great detail.. A comprehensive look, which went beyond a simple postcard from Buenos Aires.
He came on Holy Thursday in 2008 to wash the feet of those who were discarded by society, addicted to paco, traversed by the marginalization of drugs and violence in Villa 21. It was there that we began this journey.
When we heard this news 10 years ago, we realized that the Church on the way out that he is proposing, that Church as a field hospital, which are very beautiful and very strong words that mark us an open style of Church that has room for We all had already begun to live it in a particular way, we as village priests in the Hogares de Cristo who were born there, in the villas of Buenos Aires.
Today, thank God, they are spread throughout the country, Bergoglio’s message has become Francis’ message and reaches the whole world. This world, the care of the common home, the care of the person, of each poorer person, to see in the poor not only someone that we must simply help, but a protagonist of history.
For this reason, the message of Francis is a message that challenges us, that gives us strength and that strengthens the Christian spirit. He also strengthens those who are not, because he became a planetary leader. Just as decades ago we saw men of other faiths in Gandhi or Luther King, we saw men who could interpret humanity. Today humanity is interpreted by Francisco.
I think it’s part of the World Cup celebration. If we celebrate the World Cup, to be more profound, we can do it by celebrating that we have an Argentine who is a spiritual leader in the world. How profound and how important to all of us.
For us, as Hogares de Cristo, these 15 years that we are going to celebrate in Luján, together with the 10 years of Pope Francis, will be a very important moment for everyone.
* President of the Large Family of the Hogar de Cristo.
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by Father José Di Paola*
