A HUNDRED ARMS AND MANY MORE!

By Fr. Alfredo M. Tortorella

Bucchianico (Ch), the town where St. Camillus de Lellis (1550-1614) was born, was chosen as the destination of the annual pilgrimage organised by the section for pastoral care for the young of the Archdiocese of Manfredonia-Vieste-San Giovanni Rotondo.

About 600 young people, accompanied by their parish priests and catechists, thus came together on Sunday 29 October 2017 in this town of Abruzzi, the town which witnessed the birth of our holy Founder of the Ministers of the Sick (Camillians) and reformer of nursing for the sick. These young people experienced a day of fraternal encounter, great joy and touching spirituality. St. Camillus, as was observed, is profoundly linked to Gargano. Here, between Manfredonia and San Giovanni Rotondo, in the now distant year 1575, when he was only twenty-five years old, there took place his extraordinary conversion which led him to abandon the dissolute life of a mercenary soldier and gambler to embrace Christ who was present above all in his personal ‘wounds’, and thus in the infirmity of  the sick people who in a short time he would encounter in the hospitals of Rome. A message, that of Camillus, which is eloquent and strong for young people as well: love is lived when one ‘moves out of oneself’, from self-commiseration for one’s own miseries and failures towards the needs of other people. And thus the observation that the more one gives, the more, surprisingly, one receives, in line with the message that comes to us from the Gospel.

The Holy Mass, presided over by Don Stefano Mazzone – the Vicar General – who on behalf of the Archbishop, Msgr. Michele Castoro, encouraged the young people present to continue on their ecclesial pathway with force and conviction; the moments of fraternity with packed lunches and visits to the places of St. Camillus; and lastly the joyous witness of young people of Rome involved in ‘service to sick people in their homes’ together with the Daughters of St. Camillus, made this day a real event to be remembered.

St. Camillus used to say “I would like to have a hundred arms to serve all the poor and sick of the world”. This was a phrase that revealed his desire to be able do much more! From this phrase came a song entitled ‘A Hundred Arms’, whose notes – in an authentic moment of celebration – accompanied the end of this Day for Young People in Bucchianico, with their return in the evening to the various communes of the archdiocese.

The hope is that the ‘hundred arms’ of love desired by St. Camillus – and many others as well! – will be those of our young people who in discovering within themselves a great capacity for love will give themselves with generosity to service and care for our urban and ecclesial communities!

PHOTOGALLERY