By Salvatore Cernuzio
It is a matter of dignity, even more than clean clothes and blankets. In the tent city – or rather, “shantytown” of San Ferdinando, a Calabrian city of around 175,000 inhabitants – hundreds of African immigrants live in poverty and squalor, waiting for their residency permits. Many work in the fields, often without work contracts.
On Nov 27, the Pope’s charitable outreach has arrived in this industrial area of Reggio Calabria with the opening of the seventh “Pope Francis Laundry,” following those opened in the Italian cities of Rome, Genoa, Turin, Naples, and Catania.
The initiative, developed and promoted by Procter & Gamble Italy, in collaboration with Haier Europe and supported by the Apostolic Almoner and the Diocese of Oppido Mamertina–Palmi, caters to migrants, the poor, and the homeless, enabling them to wash their clothes and blankets and maintain personal hygiene. All services are completely free.
“Mopeds have license plates; we have nothing”
“This offers a way to restore dignity to people who are not dying of hunger but are dying because they feel invisible,” Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, the Papal Almoner, told Vatican News.
The residents of San Ferdinando, primarily immigrants from Senegal, Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, and other parts of Africa, have lived there for up to 15 years without even having an identity card.
“When I went there, I asked them, ‘What do you need?’ Do you know what they told me? ‘We want to be seen!’” Cardinal Krajewski recounted. “One young man looked me in the eye and said: ‘We’ve lived here for many years. We need documents. Mopeds even have license plates, but we as human beings have nothing.’”
Help with documents
In addition to five showers and a laundry area equipped with four washing machines and four dryers provided by Procter & Gamble, another service will be made available for these “invisible” people of San Ferdinando: a “Help Desk” for those in need of document assistance, explained Deacon Michele Vomera, director of the diocesan Caritas.
“We’re talking about hundreds of migrant workers, up to 1,000 in the winter months and around 200 in the summer,” he said. “There are at least 18 different nationalities in this tent city, which started as an emergency response and has now become a settlement abandoned by the authorities. These are people,” the Deacon Vomera added, “who don’t have access to a primary care physician, don’t have a tax ID number, and lack what seems basic to us but are insurmountable obstacles for them due to the complexities of Italian bureaucracy.”
The help desk will be mobile, housed in a Fire Brigade container, Deacon Vomera says. He also announced another initiative: “We are about to sign an agreement to have another room where the Sisters of Charity can start a small Italian language school.”
Shower and laundry services
The project includes several initiatives. There are even plans to add barber services, all interlinked to serve men (mostly between 40 and 45 years old, though the age range is 18 to 60) who lack even the most basic services.
These efforts are part of the hope and mercy gestures the Pope has called for dioceses worldwide to implement in preparation for the upcoming Jubilee.
“‘What sign can we offer?’ Bishop Giuseppe Alberti asked. Many organizations already provide food, so hunger is not the primary issue. Hygiene emerged as the most pressing need,” said Deacon Vomera. “So, together with Cardinal Krajewski, the Bishop, and a wonderful synergy between various organizations, we came up with this project.”
The laundry will be managed by volunteers from the Caritas of Oppido Mamertina–Palmi. It is equipped with washing machines and dryers donated by Haier Europe and will be supplied with detergents like Dash and Lenor from Procter & Gamble, along with cleaning supplies, personal hygiene products like Head & Shoulders and Pantene shampoos, and razors and shaving creams from Gillette.
A supportive community
“For our community, this is a wonderful sign,” commented the director of Caritas, eager to describe the vibrant solidarity in the area, where “immigrants outnumber Italians.” Integration is “peaceful,” and the relationships are “beautiful.”
In addition to the foreign workers, some Afghan families have settled in abandoned houses with subsidized rents.
“Local residents cook and bring food to them, and they reciprocate with traditional dishes. They live peacefully, have created a small economy, and manage two supermarkets. It can be said that the town thrives thanks to these people.”
In the midst of all this, the Pope’s charitable outreach has arrived in San Ferdinando to remind everyone that “dignity does not mean living in a tent but having a home, clean clothes, and the ability to exchange conversation with a neighbor.” – Vatican News
