‘The Church has a special love for those who suffer’: these were the words of H.E. Msgr  Zygmunt Zimowski, the President of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, during the celebration of the Eucharist with sick people and their family relatives at the St. Camillus de Lellis Sanctuary on the occasion of the pilgrimage of this Vatican dicastery to Bucchianico.
At the end of the Holy Mass, in which the staff of the local UNITALSI took part, the Vicar General of the diocese of Chieti-Vasto, Msgr. Camillo Cibotti, devoted special words to thanking H.E. Zimowski for the visit. The Under-Secretary of the dicastery, Fr. Augusto Chendi, M.I., on behalf of the President, extended special thanks to all those who had come, and in a special way to the sick people and the health-care workers who were present.
Welcomed in the morning by the mayor of the town where St. Camillus was born, Dott. Mario Antonio di Paolo, the members of the Pontifical Council then visited the places that witnessed the birth and early youth of the ‘Giant of Charity’.
In the afternoon the pilgrimage continued with a visit to the Sanctuary of the Holy Face in Manoppello where its members received the greetings of the Archbishop of Chieti-Vasto, Msgr. Bruno Forte.
The visit of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers to  Bucchianico bore witness to the devotion of this dicastery to St. Camillus, the ‘initiator’, to employ the words of Archbishop Zimowski, ‘of a new schola caritatis for health-care workers and all those who bend down before their suffering neighbour’.

The press and the media gave much coverage to the visit.
For photographs of the visit click here