VELLETRI (current events) – a long and special day
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Today was truly a long and special day for the staff and inmates of the large penitentiary facility in via Cisternense. This morning with the show of the singer-songwriter Luca Guadagnini and his band, in the afternoon still great emotions and a high moment of spiritual reflection for a group of people confined in the Veliterno prison with the arrival of the itinerant Madonna of Fatima (Portugal).
The statue is the protagonist of a singular story still told today in secular sources: 13 May 1917 And the day the Virgin Mary first appeared in the highlands Of a small village of‘Extremadura to three shepherd children: Lucia Dos Santos And Francis And Jacinta Marto. On this occasion the Madonna of Fatima (a charming area of Portugal) asked the people for penance And conversion. She arrived in Velletri by helicopter two weeks ago and was taken on display at the Church of San Giovanni Battista, where she returned this evening and where she will remain for another week before leaving again for the town of Fatima in Portugal where she has her official headquarters .
This afternoon in the prison chapel, equipped with the Holy Door (inaugurated and blessed 8 years ago by the then bishop Apicella), Don Andrea Pacchiarotti, parish priest of the Church of San Giovanni Battista, met numerous inmates, pronounced Mass and exchanged a few words with them and said a prayer together.
Naturally, aided by some volunteers from the Veliterna Parish in front of the Court, he also brought the Madonna of Fatima to the altar during a visit to Velletri. Also present in the front row were the director of the Prison Anna Rita Gentile, the head of the Legal and Pedagogical Area Sabrina Falcone, the educators of the Penitentiary, the Penitentiary Police, with Inspector Pietro Coppola, Commander Caputi and other agents. The people confined in the Penitentiary Institute, one of the largest in Italy, who participated and all the staff were very satisfied, encouraged by the words of the Gospel and the other edifying phrases pronounced by Don Andrea Pacchiarotti. Everyone was also impressed by the commitment made by the zealous and enterprising director Anna Rita Gentile to have masses celebrated in the welcoming prison chapel more frequently, in agreement with the prison administration and the diocese of Velletri to organize the program shortly .
