Padre Bernardo invita alla fiaccolata per la pace tra ebrei e musulmani.
Don Padre Bernardo Gianni, the Prior of the San Miniato al Monte abbey in Florence, has called for a torchlight procession for peace with the Jews and Muslims of the city. The event will take place next Monday evening, leading to the basilica. Padre Bernardo, who was invited by Pope Francis to lead spiritual exercises for the Roman Curia in 2019, made this appeal in a public letter released today. He invites people to ascend the mountain to the abbey in the midst of these dark hours of anguish, confusion, and concerns for the future of humanity. He also extends a special invitation to the friends of the Jewish and Islamic communities, who have long expressed the organic and plural richness of the city, to join them on Monday evening. Having them at San Miniato al Monte, embraced by their genuine affection and deep respect for their indescribable suffering, would be a prophetic sign of inestimable significance, according to Padre Bernardo. He references Mayor Giorgio La Pira, who describes Florence as the “city on the mountain, beautiful, like messianic Jerusalem, radiating peace and light.” Padre Bernardo emphasizes that they will not have words, slogans, or banners on Monday evening. Instead, their faces, stares, silence, and awareness of the pain of the hostages and their families, as well as the river of mostly innocent blood shed in these days of ferocity, and the friendly fire from lit torches as a barrier against the darkness of the night, will be their renewed message of peace and hope. Padre Bernardo also recalls poet Mario Luzi, who, while greeting Pope John Paul II in Piazza Signoria in 1986, a pope who was a friend and tireless defender of peace in the Middle East, said, “Man, they learned to say this word with particular intention here in Florence; as I understand it, a prodigy in which creation has identified itself with the creator; or as a mystery whose contours are impossible to define.”
L’invito di Padre Bernardo, “Una fiaccolata per la pace con ebrei e musulmani”
Firenze Padre Bernardo invita alla fiaccolata per la pace tra ebrei e musulmani. GN