AMERICA/ARGENTINA - “To have come out of hell, and to proclaim that Christ is risen”. The Familia Grande Hogar de Cristo network and the new mission of Father Charly
Buenos Aires (Agenzia Fides) - A great celebration accompanied the seventeenth ‘anniversary’ of the Familia Grande Hogar de Cristo in Buenos Aires, which was founded when Jorge Mario Bergoglio was Archbishop of the city. That was in 2008, and the presence of priests in the poorest neighborhoods of Buenos Aires, the Villas Miseria, had been spreading for some time. From this – ironic – name for these poor areas, the curas villeros took their name: priests who began to participate in the lives of the poorest, caring firsthand for the great needs they encountered and sharing this commitment with others, thus becoming the center of communities that were born and multiplied.
The true beginning of the "Familia Grande" is dated to Holy Thursday 2008: On that day, Archbishop Bergoglio washed the feet of young people who had embarked on a path out of drug addiction and inaugurated the first "Hogar," summarizing its method as "taking life as it comes," in a work "body to body" with the brothers and sisters one encounters.
On Sunday, March 16, 2025, the Basilica of Lujan fwas illed with many joyful people. From all parts of the country, and even from Ecuador and Paraguay, people from the Hogares of the Familia Grande gathered for Mass to give thanks for the embrace they had received over the years and to pray for their beloved Pope Francis.
But there was another reason, another occasion for prayer. The ever-popular Father Carlos "Charly" Olivero, who was part of the first group in the history of the Familia Grande when he arrived at Villa 21 as a seminarian, was called to an important task.
Father Pepe Di Paola (whom many like to call a "founding member" of the Familia Grande) announced this in his homily, and Bishop Oscar Ojea—former president of the Argentine Bishops' Conference and father figure to many Curas villeros—affirmed before blessing him: "Father Charly will live in Bogota and work on behalf of CELAM (the Latin American Episcopal Council) to spread the Familia Grande method throughout the continent.
Bishop Ojea, with the pride and tenderness of a father, recalled a passage from the Aparecida Document: "Knowing Jesus is the best gift a person can receive." Having met him is the best thing that could have happened to us in our lives. Making him known through our words and deeds is a great joy for us". He also recalled that "to entrust the mission of the 'Hogar de Cristo' to Father Charly means to entrust him with the power, the ministry, the mission of proclaiming the Resurrection of Jesus"; for "every member of the 'Hogar de Cristo' proclaims the Resurrection. He was in hell and came out of it; he proclaims this and brings it to the world. This is the proclamation of the Gospel, to convey that Jesus is life, the true happiness that man has."
Bishop Ojea blessed Father Charly and his new mission "to bring to all of Latin America this very rich experience of the Gospel that he has had over so many years, in which he has known the Virgin, consecrated himself to her, and come to know Jesus." The entire Familia Grande unites around Father Charly and prays that "the brothers and sisters of great Latin America may be enriched with this wonderful gift that Jesus and the Virgin have entrusted to us."
On Sunday, a new stage in the history of the "Familia Grande" began in the Basilica of Lujan. "There is a need," Father Charly himself said in a video from "Pastoral Villera," "for this unconditional embrace." (Agenzia Fides, 20/3/2025)
