60 years of help to the needy in Spain: there are plenty of reasons, your help is missing

The Spanish section of the Pontifical Foundation helps the Church in need (ACN) celebrates 60 years of presence in Spain with the campaign “Reasons are left over, your help is missing”And with an eye on the jubilee of redemption in 2033.

Promoted by the Mercedarian priest Alfonso López Quintás, the then called the Spanish National Center for Help to the Persecuted Church began to walk in 1965, after meeting Fr. Werenfried Van Straaten, founder of the initiative that, over the years, became an association dependent on the Holy See (John Paul II, 1983) and then a Pontifical Foundation (Benedict XVI, 2011).

The program of acts of celebration of this anniversary included numerous Eucharistas of Thanksgiving and the pilgrimage to Rome on the occasion of the jubilee of the martyrs, which coincided with the period of vacant headquarters after the death of Pope Francis and the celebration of the conclave in which León XIV was chosen.

José María Garrido, director of ACN Spain, who joined the Foundation recently, shares with ACI Press that he feels heir to a great work prior: “I am newly arrived. With which, the legacy they have left me has been an impressive legacy, of growth of the Pontifical Foundation within our country, Father López Quintás was the one who had the opportunity to create this foundation in our country. And, from then on, what we have done has been to support, together with the other 24 offices that exist throughout the world and the Königstein International Office, thousands and thousands of projects, more than 5,000 projects a year in more than 130 countries. ”

This work would be impossible without the support of the diocesan delegates, a team of 200 volunteers and, of course, with those who generously donate, as the manager ratifies: “For us it is a privilege to have the support of so many benefactors who want to support evangelization, the mission to the nations so that the Church does not stop. ”

“What happens to them happens to me too”

Among the benefactors, Gallardo highlights the example of a priest of Madrid who has decided to read all his assets to the Foundation: “He has even given us the funds, which we are guarding them, and from time to time he comes to be able to withdraw some money for his monthly expenses.”

Among those who have lent themselves to help in this 60th anniversary campaign, are Rosa Collado and Ramón Tejada, a marriage in Madrid. In a promotional video, Rosa explains that she feels part of the Church, which is why she cannot be indifferent to what happens to those who live persecution: “I can not give me the same. What happens to them happens to me too.”

For his part, Ramón highlights that the lesson that Christians persecuted are willing to do for their faith and “the renunciation of anything for testimony of Christ. What an example they give us! How are you not going to help, how you are not going to collaborate if they are the ones who are truly holding the Church.”

In the Foundation there is a professional team of which José Fernández Crespo, promotion director, area that considers “the heart” of ACN Spain. “What we do is bring the suffering church and the church discriminated and persecuted to those places where they are not known, rather where it is unknown. But also support the priest in his pastoral work, that is our identity,” he summarizes.

Thus, they accompany each liturgical time with different prayer and awareness activities, also in schools and new realities of the Church, especially with first announcement realities, “because we use very powerful testimonies, which are in the first person.”

While the essential work for years has been through the capillarity of the dioceses, with their thousands of parishes, there is now a very interesting relationship with those who develop the new evangelization: “Before we called us many parish priests and now, for example, the thing changes. And it is very interesting because new movements appear, new realities appear” such as Alpha courses, withdrawals of Emaus, conjugal love project, Hakuna, etc.

This has helped the growth of the needy church in Spain, which in recent years is remarkable: “Look, five or six years ago we had a presence around 25 dioceses. Now we have already reached 44 of the 70s, we still have a large tour,” he says.

“Hug something that is impossible to hug”

We ask Fernández Crespo, who has had the opportunity to know first -hand portions of the needy and persecuted church, far from Spain, that offers us two brushstrokes on how the work developed by the Foundation is concretized.

In Nigeria he visited a host center for people kidnapped by Boko Haram. There he met a 20 -year -old girl who had been kidnapped, taken to the forest and repeatedly raped. He had two children and was repudiated by their families after being released.

Joseph recalls “to be in front of her, look her in the eye and not see humanity in her eyes. Suddenly it seems that humanity did not exist in her” because of his sufferings. Thanks to the support that acn Spain offers, the priests of the area not only study theology, but psychology.

“It is beautiful as they tell you that they are studying psychology for two years, while theology, to be able to accompany, not only to help, but to accompany in all this duel. And this girl can, one, forgive itself for what has happened. Two, to forgive his family because he has repudiated her. And three, forgive those who have done this. Forgive and welcome all this pain. Earth.

Another case that has impacted him is that of the Dalit, the intocate caste of India, who are those that become Christianity. Why?: “Because no one can look at them, it is forbidden to look in their eyes, touch them. And instead, they are on the street thrown and suddenly they see a white skirt, with blue dyes that are those of the sisters of Calcutta, Santa Teresa, and suddenly look at them. And a shine in the eyes, a smile, who look at them and they look at them and touch them,” he describes.