There was a fairy tale by Gianni Rodari who imagined what the summer schools did, in the long time of the holidays. Deserved resting of cobblestones, scarabocchi on the walls, scratched benches but also, soon, a lot of nostalgia for those laughing visins, of those ran in the corridors, of those festive combicks.
A school closed for a short time gives a place, it makes a little order. A closed school is therefore useless, it arouses sadness, it is a cake without party, a party without friends.
And he asked her? What do the churches are closed in summer? Because the churches more and more often close. Office hours when it is fine, sometimes extraordinary opening only in the morning, and even if the offices stop the doors only around mid -August, from June to September the churches go on vacation.
The people who live for them moves to the sea, in the mountains, may be. The roundabouts on the beaches will be happy, the hats between the pines. But the priests, the deacons, the pastoral advice, the animators, is it possible that everyone is traveling or in retreat?
The churches should not resemble the doors of the registry or post office, parish priests to officials or business leaders.
On a Saturday in mid -June, Florence, Santa Maria Novella: prefestive, solemn, participatory mass, and it happens that after the Eucharist you attach one minute with our eyes upwards, enchanted by Giotto’s crucifix, by the frescoes too distant and therefore invisible of the apse.
“No visit, we have to go out, we close.” It was not the parish priest of course, but the diligent employee. Of a museum, with paths guided by barriers and cords, inaccessible without a ticket.
Here, the churches should be neither companies nor museums, because the works that adorn them have been made by men, but to the glory of God.
Otherwise those sculpted capitals up there are senseless, those miniature paintings with stories of saints and prophets, taught among the vaults, which we see hardly. To leave a mark, to say “here I am, my job I offer you”.
It doesn’t matter that these are workers or artists paid by ambitious clients. From how they sculpted, painted, chiseled it is clear that they were at the service of the Church, not only of that church.
The churches were home, asylum, and still are, for many who have no home or asylum or seek a word of consolation, hope, forgiveness or a kneeler to pray.
Why should shopping centers be opened and not the beautiful churches or the poor more anonymous churches, but inhabited by the Eucharist?
I know well that you have to take care of precious furnishings, that the money and the custody staff are scarce. But the Lord is more important than every work of art, his presence is a gift, let’s not leave him alone.
The open church is worth more than a parish room, a guest accommodation, a football pitch.
We have used many times as a slogan the heartfelt indication of Pope Francis “Church out”. But if we prevent the entry, the adoration of the tabernacle, we go out to wander, without a destination.
(photo above: Istock)
