Helping those in difficulty is a very noble gesture, but it must not have ulterior motives. And this is the mission of Caritas which, since time immemorial, has been at the service of others. The operational center for mothers and children inaugurated in Crotone continues in this vein, managed by the pastoral body of the CEI of the Archdiocese together with the Pro-Life Movement. A space set up in the Caritas headquarters in via Raimondi – open every day from 9:00 to 12:00 – dedicated to pregnant women and new mothers in need, where they can find all the support: from bottles to milk, from baby food to clothes, shoes and cribs.
«Our scope of charity is expanding, which wants to go further, to meet many needs – Don Stefano Cava, director of the diocesan Caritas, told journalists – this is a reality that touches the hearts of many people. It is assistance to pregnant women and women who give birth in a form of poverty; people who, perhaps, cannot buy diapers, baby food and many other things. With the Movement for Life we thought, in synergy, of accompanying these families who are in so much need.” Obviously the center – or as Don Stefano renamed it “the cross-stitch” – is open to anyone who can and wants to lend a hand with donations of goods and “you can very well come here to the headquarters in via Raimondi – he further declared – and deliver what he wants to give. We assist, above all, newborn children up to 12 years of age; we have also extended the age because we have noticed that there is also a need for these children who are growing up, before adolescence.”
«We – Caterina Bumbaca, president of the Italian Movement for Life and the “Santa Gianna Beretta Molla” Help for Life Center, also declared to journalists – we will support pregnant women and all mothers, without distinction of religious culture and ethnicity of origin, because the Movement for Life, both national and regional – on which we depend – has as its first point of statute that of offering welcome, listening and closeness to any person who comes to us”.
Also present at the inauguration of the center were the mayor Vincenzo Voce, and the archbishop of Crotone-Santa Severina, mons. Angelo Raffaele Panzetta. «It is an act of hope – the bishop declared to reporters – because the degree of civilization of a community can be seen in two things: by the acceptance of life, both in the initial phase and in its completion. Therefore, from how we treat the conceived, the children, the elderly, the suffering: from there we can see the degree of civility. This space, at the service of life, constitutes an increase in the level of civilization of our community; I am very happy that within the spaces of the Curia there is a service in favor of life. It’s a very beautiful thing.”
interviews:
Don Stefano Cava – director of Caritas Crotone
mgr. Angelo Panzetta – archbishop of Crotone-S.Severina
Caterina Bumbaca – Movement for Life
