Pope's island visit carried light to the end of world
Vatican City, 16 July 2013: After the unexpected July 8 visit from Pope Francis, the
little Italian island of Lampedusa received “an electric shock,” because he shed light
on “the problem of immigration and the suffering of immigration,” said Archbishop
Francesco Montenegro of the Agrigento, Sicily archdiocese.
It is “meaningful
that Pope Francis made his first trip to Lampedusa, thus putting into practice what
he asked: to go to the end of the world, to the peripheries and the poor,” observed
Archbishop Montenegro, whose archdiocese includes Italy’s southernmost territory.
Part
of the Italian region of Sicily, Lampedusa is in fact closer to Africa than it is
to Italy. And immigration has always been a concern for the little island, which is
inhabited by about 5,000 people.
Archbishop Montenegro explained in a July
15 interview with CNA that the people of Lampedusa remember the first immigrants knocking
on their doors in the 50s. Back then, “it could be a Tunisian that crossed the sea
in search of luck.”
And even though the fear of a possible exodus from Africa
dates began in the 50s, it was only at the end of the 80s that migration flows from
Africa to Lampedusa started increasing each year.
In fact, since 1988, almost
20,000 people have died in the stretch of sea between Africa and Lampedusa. “That
stretch of sea is a tomb,” Archbishop Montenegro told Pope Francis during a lunch
at the end of May. The idea to pay a visit to Lampedusa first came to Pope Francis
in April.
Archbishop Montenegro recounts that, “Don Stefano Nastasi, the parish
priest of Lampedusa, wrote a letter to the Pope, explaining the situation of the island
and inviting him, a son of migrants, to go and visit Lamepdusa.”
The letter
was delivered and highlighted by Migrantes, a foundation of the Italian Bishops’ conference
that deals with the issue of migration, which is also led by Archbishop Montenegro.
The
issue also came up when the bishops of Sicily made their ad limina visit to Pope Francis
and the tomb of St. Peter in May. During the visit the Agrigento archbishop raised
the problem of immigration across the Mediterranean Sea.
Archbishop Montenegro
told CNA that Pope Francis reacted to his words by saying, “I must make a second trip
to Italy this year.” “I thought,” he explained, “that the Pope just thought of planning
a trip for the following year.”
In fact, the visit appeared to come together
rather quickly, since the archbishop found out about where the Holy Father would visit
“just a week before he came.” After the visit, Archbishop Montenegro asked the pontiff
if he was happy about it, and the Pope answered “yes.”
He was “very focused
on his goal, that was to make a visit for mercy and the memory of the deaths,” the
archbishop said. When it comes to the political realm, Archbishop Montenegro stated
that finding governmental solutions is the responsibility of politicians, not churchmen.Source:
CNA/EWTN News