Dear Father Emanuele, today our community is celebrating the gift of your arrival amongst us.
We welcome you to your new home and your new family.
We are grateful to you for saying ‘yes’ to our Bishop and for accepting his invitation to walk with us and become one of us.
Leaving a mission in distant lands after so many years to arrive at a new parish, in a very different setting, is never easy. There are new faces to meet, new realities to discover, new relationships to forge and, not least, new names to remember and a journey yet to be charted anew. And we shall walk this path together.
Our parish church was consecrated in 1926, under the patronage of Our Lady of the Rosary. Summing up nearly a hundred years of history in just a few lines is no easy task. Our neighbourhood has changed in recent years – even compared to just a decade ago – becoming a place where different religions, cultures and languages come together; and perhaps it will not seem to you that you have strayed far from the mission where you were until just a few days ago.
But you will get to know us little by little, and we will get to know you. You will have the support of Father Massimo, our parish priest, and Father Andrea, who will accompany you in your priestly ministry. And alongside them, the community of the Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Queen of Peace, who for many years have dedicated themselves to the good of the community and the neighbourhood.
You will meet the children attending catechism classes, accompanied by their catechists as they set out to discover in Jesus a friend who loves them and who never abandons them. Our young people, who, together with Father Andrea, are maturing and discovering the values of friendship and sharing, and of the Gospel, in a world where the danger of going astray is always just around the corner.
You will meet adults and families, each with their own wealth of experience but also their own vulnerabilities, and the volunteers from all the parish associations and groups which operate within our parish in various areas, each with its own distinctive character and catering to different stages of life: newborns, children, young people struggling with their studies, those going through difficult times and in need of support to get back on their feet, the elderly and the sick… as you go along, you will discover
Different names, different people, different areas of focus, yet all united by a common thread: three words – FAITH, HOPE, CHARITY.
The parish comes to life when people gather around it, giving of themselves to others and to the community.
You will meet the elderly and the sick who will look to you as a friend who listens to them, bringing them the comfort of God’s presence during life’s difficult moments, and people in need of consolation and spiritual and moral support
Dear Father Emanuele, as we welcome you as a gift sent by the Lord, we offer you our collaboration and our willingness to walk this stretch of the journey together, illuminated by the light of Christ, through the intercession of Our Lady of the Rosary and Sant’Agabio.
May your journey amongst us be a blessed one!
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