Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Cuenca (Agenzia Fides) – I am almost at the end of my trip in Cuenca. The weather is a bit schizophrenic: on-and-off rain; on-and-off cloud cover. The colors shine and then are dulled, or completely vanish into the rest of the landscape. I am told of a center for girls from broken families, which used to be an orphanage. I decide to pay a visit.
Some are worried about the entrance of immigrants and they do not realize that the entire world is entering into a new reality that has caught us all by surprise. Or better said, it has surprised those who have not wished to listen to the voices of those who has been announcing it from the many mission lands.
The Europeans inevitably grow older and have increasingly less children. And why? There has been an emphasis on secularization and on a society void of principles of true solidarity. Abortions are increasingly easier to obtain. Selfish ideals. The media is more and more focused on superficial issues and relativist perspectives. There are very few areas of true information and debate. All this has given way to an accelerated process of dehumanization in our societies. For a Catholic news agency like Fides, recognizing that there has been a falling away from Christian roots – as has been confirmed, for example, in the European Union’s constitution – produces a sense of dissatisfaction that leads us to make even more efforts in defending the person created by God, with coherent information and fidelity to the Magisterium.
The fields, factories, businesses...need working hands, professionals, and the less you have to pay them, the better. The “caporalato” (an Italian system by which agricultural workers are illegally hired and paid below the national minimum wage), the exploitation, is today a widespread phenomenon, where crime has found a new source of illegal profits, even here in this area in Spain, where it seems less evident than in other parts.
The house where I am going is a house that the Bishop of Cuenca entrusted to a newly-founded order, highly-efficient and widespread, with young vocations. The Sisters all come from a well-educated background and all of them know more than one language. They are a community with a great generosity and efficiency, who live in poverty and prayer. The young foundation is called the Servant Sisters of the Home of the Mother. I had the pleasure of meeting their founder in Rome. He is a priest of my same age, with a cassock and a laptop. It is one more reason to visit this place, especially because of its relation with my study: to understand the migratory movements and see how they are related to the complex task of the Evangelization of Peoples, and thus, what that implies in being a missionary today. All this, without letting social issues forget the Gospel, the Holy Father’s Magisterium, or the time we should spend with God in prayer.
After a little over 20 minutes on the Spanish highway, lined with windmills and little villages with white houses, I reach my destination. Sister Maria is waiting for me when I walk in the door. Gathered around her are the faces of young girls who are radiant with joy, the majority of which are South Americans. Sr. Maria accompanies me on a tour of the house, explaining everything and answering my questions.
Sr. Maria, could you tell me a little about this center. What do you do? How did it begin and what do you have in mind for the future of the youth you care for? This house used to be an orphanage and now it is a home for girls from poor families...
Yes, this is a center for girls from poor families and orphans. It was begun about 40 years ago by a woman who was devout, wealthy, generous, and without children. She donated all her property to those that she considered her favored children: poor girls and orphans; girls who did not have resources to study or build their own lives. Since then, society has been greatly changed. There are an increasing number of girls with problematic families: orphans for lack of affection, more than for lack of parents. They are very young “women” that are in need of help, dedication, to little by little forget those memories of suffering and abuse. We try to give them the love that they have never known, so they can regain confidence in themselves and in others. The Bishop is the President of the Foundation, with the help of the Mayor (a woman), and then there’s us, the Sisters, and we are the educators. Here, we have a family environment, a lot of time spent together. Each girl has their own room. We try to help them learn everything, from the basics to details like how to acquire good taste in decorating. Here they learn how to do a bit of everything, just like we do.
Are they all Catholic? I would like to know how young, dedicated Sisters manage living in a diversity of cultures and religions, complicated personal histories, etc...
We certainly cannot and do not have any intention of trying to make any of them practice our faith, but we can offer our daily example. We educate in the spirit of Saint John Bosco, and in the evening, in the chapel we give them a little “Buenos Noches” (“Good Night”) chat where we try to lead them to love the Lord and His Mother. We do not try to hide what it is that gives meaning to our lives. Nowadays in Spain, very little attention is given to God. Sometimes we have the impression that we are up against immense barriers of prejudice, and we feel powerless in healing the wounds that these girls carry inside them. But that Crucifix on the wall reminds us that we cannot abandon them. If the Lord’s Mother has brought them here, it must be for some reason. And that is why we do not abandon them to their own fate. Our effort is to make them feel like they are in a family, show them the affection they have never known. We show them the path of Goodness.
The process of maturing in goodness is not easy, yet you said “show them” the path of Goodness. But later, when these girls go to the school, and come into contact with a different environment than the one they have here with you, how do they react? How do they handle the cultural diversities in a non-protected environment like that? The school is really a system that must lead to a common culture. Is this an obstacle? Doesn’t this interfere with your work here with them, in regaining self-esteem and the will to live?
Yes, in part it is like that, there are problems. They come from difficult situations and it is not easy to help them. At times, more than integration, there is a desire to imitate the society around them, which influences them with all the problems that the youth face today. The difference is that these youth – from the area – have never known real suffering, while the girls have. Thus, a process of imitation and not integration begins, and if the example is negative, everything worsens. So, all this is true only in part, because if the girls come from immigrant families, they realize that they need help. There are stories of misery in search of a dream. Our task is to transform this dream into a positive reality, with our example of faith lived coherently. If you want to know more, you can read more of their thoughts, but as long as they remain anonymous.
Sr. Maria opens two notebooks, flips through the pages, and with a big smile tells me to read them. The first is from a Colombian girl: “We didn’t have any money, or food, so my mom came here to Spain for work and sent a bit of money back to Grandma. I am here so I can have a little more of a life than I have had until now. I wish I could live a normal life with my mom in a beautiful house. I don’t want all this to stay a dream. The Sisters told me that it can come true, even starting with nothing. For a lot of the girls in your countries, what is normal for them is a daily struggle for us...like eating, having running water, a bed, a kitchen and not a fire in a little house with 8, 10 people, like mine. I want my mom and I to have a house where rain and wind can’t get in.”
The second notebook is from a girl from Honduras: “We do not have money enough to live all together. I was living with my uncles for a year. Now I am here because my dad died. I have gotten used to the cold here.”
As the landscapes pass by me in the car window, now on my way, I think about this last sentence – about the cold. What cold was being referred to? Probably that of our indifference, are inability to accept, to see the other person as a person. (Luca de Mata, writing from Cuenca) (Part 3 – to be continued) (Agenzia Fides 31/7/2008)
