"We must weep for migrants like a mother weeps for her children". Thus Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, president of the Italian Bishops' Conference, who presided yesterday over the Prayer Vigil 'Dying of Hope' in memory of the migrants who died on the journeys of hope towards Europe, 66,000 since 1990. (Read the homily)
A moved crowd, inside the basilica of Santa Maria in Trastevere and in the square in front, welcomed the entrance of the cross made from the planks of a boat wrecked off Lampedusa. Next to it two images that describe the daily struggle of migrants: a photo of a boat capsized in the Mediterranean and one of a few young people in front of a barbed wire that seals European borders, perhaps in the Balkans or in the woods in Belarus.
"Who mourned for these brothers? I carry this question in my heart, the one Pope Francis asked on his apostolic visit to Lampedusa in July 2013. It is a tragedy that has continued in the last hours. It is our duty to raise our prayer for them, a cry of pain, a denunciation so that everyone's dignity be respected,' said Msgr Baldo Reina, vicegerent of the Diocese of Rome, opening the vigil. After Card. Zuppi's homily, names were recalled and stories read of people who died trying to reach Europe by sea or along land routes.
At the end, Card. Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, Archbishop of Kinshasa, said: "I have come from the other side of the world, where so many left in search of a better life that ended up in the desert or in the Mediterranean Sea. Let me thank Sant'Egidio and all of you for this moment of prayer for our brothers and sisters who left. It is also up to us to change the future of the world".
The vigil was promoted, on the eve of World Refugee Day, by the Community of Sant'Egidio together with other associations committed every day - as Pope Francis would say - to "welcoming, protecting, promoting and integrating" people who have fled wars or intolerable situations in their countries: Centro Astalli Association, Caritas Italiana, Migrantes Foundation, Evangelical Churches Federation in Italy, Scalabrini Migration International Network, ACLI, Papa Giovanni XXIII Community Association, ACSE.
