By Gianni Criveller
I write this from the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) theological seminary in Monza, near Milan, in Lombardy, the area where covid-19 coronavirus is doing the greatest damage. PIME Theological International Seminary hosts 57 students, candidates to the missionary life from a dozen countries. Four missionaries, including myself are with them. I am dean of studies and a teacher in the school. We have been isolated since Sunday, February 23. The quarantine became ever more stricter. We are still all fine and healthy. We deal everyday with the situation looking for new solutions and remaining united.
We wear masks provided by our most generous Hong Kong friends, as in Italy masks are not yet available. The impossibility of obtaining surgical masks eight weeks after the declaration of the emergency is the single most serious failure by the Italian authorities. We are lucky to have generous and caring friends in Hong Kong. And I take this opportunity to thank all of them.
Photo: courtesy of Father Gianni Criveller
The rector of the seminary, Father Luigi Bonalumi and myself served in Hong Kong for many years. Since the beginning of the crisis in Lombardy, our friends, including the Catholic community in Taipo, colleagues at the Holy Spirit Study Centre and former students at the Holy Spirit College, offered to send us masks. We were moved by such generous concern and in the beginning we even thought we could do without it. But soon we accepted the gift and when parcels started to arrive, we were able to send material to other PIME communities in need in Milan, Lecco and Sotto il Monte, the latter in the tormented province of Bergamo.
We also provided protective masks the family doctors of the area, as well as other religious people and communities. Some material is still on the way from Hong Kong, as even fast delivery has shown down in these days, and custom procedure are more complicate than usual.
Our community is coping rather well with the emergency. The school, which used to operate in a rather traditional fashion has, thanks to the collaboration of students and teachers, adopted ‘distant teaching’ which allows us to safeguard the integrity of the academic programme.
External students also continue to follow lessons online. I think that keeping the academic programme helps the students to remain focused and avoid becoming victims of anxiety.
As, unfortunately, the Covid-19 coronavirus is spreading in many countries all over the world, our students worry for their families and friends far away.
As personnel are staying at home, students and priests have to do extra work such as cooking, washing the dishes, cleaning the house and gardening. We keep a safe distance between ourselves in the chapels, in the refectory and in the classrooms.
Fortunately, we have a beautiful house and a large garden where we can stroll and, occasionally, celebrate the liturgy. This is quite a privilege in these days!
It is difficult making sense of this disturbing ‘sign of the times.’ As missionaries we stay where we have to stay. Now our place is here, in the theological community of Monza, beside our students.
If we have good news from our seminary, we have mostly bad news from the area around us. Friends, collaborators and family members are sick, people we know die. We hear the sound of ambulances much too often. Thousands of health operators are sick and, so far, Italy counts 70 doctors who died in the line of duty, mostly in our Lombardy.
Similarly, around 100 priests and missionaries have died from the pandemic in this region; several of them were still engaged in pastoral activities. We do not know the number of religious sisters; certainly several dozens, including eight Comboni sisters who died in the same home in Bergamo.
Fortunately, Chinese friends came in our help! In recent days, 100,000 masks and other medical aids have arrived at the Milan Caritas. The sender is Jinde Charities, the network from Hebei, founded by Father John Baptist Zhang. The medical material is for operators and volunteers working for the poor, dormitories, centers for the disabled, residences for the elderly. Jinde Charities had already provided supplies to the Vatican and other communities in Italy.
Chinese priests working in Italy took action. Father Giovanni Battista Sun Xuyi from the Matteo Ricci Study Centre in Macerata (the hometown of Matteo Ricci), coordinated a major operation to provide medical supplies, including the highly requested anti-infection suits and glasses, to the troubled region of Le Marche.
This material cost a lot of money, fully paid by Chinese Catholics from the provinces of Shanxi, Fujian, Guangdong, Hebei, Jiangxi and Hunan, and from the cities of Shanghai and Hong Kong.
Bishop Nazzareno Marconi of Macerata stated: “This is a minor miracle of charity, made possible by many people of good will. We also thank Father Matteo Ricci who, we believe, is helping us from heaven to live through this difficult moment”.
Covid-19 also visited the much-loved monastic community of Little Family of the Assumption in Rimini, which welcomes monks, nuns and disabled people. Thanks to Chinese friends hosted there, including Father Savio, it was possible to get help from China.
Again, we are grateful to Chinese friends for their support and generosity in this time of great difficulty.
