'Many of the poor are trampled on today'

The Three Patrons' newsletter for this week.

By Michael Commane

There was an interesting article in last week’s English newspaper The Guardian. 

An Italian priest, Gianfranco Formento, has crossed swords with the new Italian interior minister and leader of the far-right Northern League Matteo Salvini.

Back in 2015 the priest placed a sign on the church in Spoletto in Umbria, where he ministers, saying: “Racists are forbidden from entering. Go home.”

Salvini saw it and wrote on his Twitter account: “Perhaps the priest prefers smugglers, slaveholders and terrorists? Pity Spoleto and this church, if this man calls himself a priest.”

“There is an evil force of racism, and Salvini has contributed to this. He’s been a magician in cultivating hate and manipulating anger. People of all ages have become racist because of the climate we’re living in,” Fr Formento has said.

At a Mass earlier this month in Rome Pope Francis said:

“The only reasonable response to the challenges presented by contemporary migration is solidarity and mercy. Governments must be less concerned with political calculations and more with an equitable distribution of responsibilities.

“Many of the poor are trampled on today. How many of the poor are being brought to ruin! All are the victims of that culture of waste that has been denounced time and time again, including migrants and refugees who continue to knock at the door of nations that enjoy greater prosperity.”

Another Italian priest, Alex Zanotelli, has called on journalists to write more on the difficulties people experience in Africa. He argues that migrants are not the parasites and invaders the far-right want us to think they are. They are fleeing from disaster, he says.

Is anyone asking who colonised and plundered the developing world?

Closer to home it was interesting to read the Bishop of Kildare and Leighlin Denis Nulty speak out last week about energy price rises, which are soon to be introduced.

He said: “The huge poverty in Ireland is energy poverty and I’m afraid a lot of people are missing it.

“The government needs to look at the price increases and think about how the poor in society can be supported, otherwise the poor are going to get even poorer.”

And that’s good lead-in to remind readers that the St Vincent de Paul collection takes place this Sunday outside the church after Mass.