A young primary school teacher taking a class discussing ‘Equality’ began by asking if anyone in the class had recently hurt there elbow. A few put their hands up so she gave each of them a plaster for their elbow. She then asked if anyone had bumped their heads. Again, a few hands went up. The teacher proceeded to give each child who had bumped his or her head a plaster for their elbow. The children looked confused. The teacher then asked if anyone who’d recently grazed their knee to put their hand up. She proceeded to give each of these children a plaster for their elbow. By this time the children were all looking very confused.
The teacher explained that although she had treated all of her class equally in giving everyone a plaster for their elbow that was clearly a silly thing to do as only some of them had hurt their elbows.
She went on to explain that equality meant giving everyone the same opportunities and this often meant treating some people differently. Some children in the school sometimes needed ear protectors because they found classrooms too noisy for them to concentrate, others might have difficulty with sitting and needed a special chairs, yet others might find concentration hard and so needed special help and so on.
The teacher then asked the class to consider how each of us could treat each other equally. After an animated discussion the class agreed that we shouldn’t always expect to be treated exactly the same or treat each other exactly the same. We should try to help one other be the best we and they can be.
80 years ago today, a priest who incarnated the ‘social gospel’ was martyred
Mar 24, 2024
Father Pietro Pappagallo, shown along with a plaque which today is displayed outside his residence in Rome. (Credit: Vatican Media.)
ROME – Exactly 80 years ago today, on March 24, 1944, the Nazi occupiers of Rome shot 335 Italians to death, mostly civilians, in a series of caves on the southern outskirts of town called the Fosse Ardeatine. The killings came in retaliation for an attack the day before by the Italian resistance that left 33 German soldiers dead, making it a ratio of ten Italian lives lost for every one German.
(In a rare lapse in Nazi efficiency, bureaucratic confusion led to five more people than strictly necessary being executed.)
Among the victims that day was one Catholic priest: Father Pietro Pappagallo, 55 years old at the time, who’d been in a Nazi prison since January, having been turned in by a snitch for his activity in sheltering Jews, monarchists, communists, intellectuals, anti-fascist activists, gays, and anyone else targeted by the occupation.
While there’s no special reason why the loss of a priest’s life matters more than anyone else’s, the Pappagallo story nonetheless merits retelling today, in part because it captures the entire drama of the early 20th century birth of “social Catholicism” in miniature.
Pietro Pappagallo was born on June 28, 1888, in the mid-sized town of Terlizzi in the Puglia region of southern Italy. His family scraped by on limited means – his father was a ropemaker, while his mother raised the eight children. As a youth he worked with his father and also did seasonal labor on local farms, until his mother decided to enroll him in a local school, from which he eventually entered the seminary.
At the time, families of a candidate for the priesthood were required to make a payment to cover the cost of his studies, so Pappagallo’s mother signed over a meager couple of pieces of land she’d inherited from her family to cover the cost.
He was ordained on April 3, 1915, having escaped being drafted for World War I because of a problem with his heel. The next day he celebrated his first Mass, and on the traditional holy card printed for the occasion, he inscribed the celebrated prayer for peace composed by Pope Benedict XV, who had memorably termed WWI “useless slaughter”: “From you, God of mercies, we implore with our groans an end to this immense scourge; from you, peaceful King, we rush with our prayers for the longed-for peace.”
Benedict XV was, in some ways, the original “Peace Pope,” and Pappagallo clearly drew inspiration from him.
Just like in the United States, in the early 20th century scores of people from Italy’s impoverished south were heading north in search of work, and Pappagallo wanted to serve them. He ended up in Rome in the 1920s, serving as director and chaplain for a boarding house attached to a massive rayon factory called Cisa Viscosa, which had been financed by American investors.
Quickly, he discovered that the hundreds of workers housed by the company were being terribly mistreated: Routinely forced to work overtime without additional pay, at the threat of being fired if they refused; denied the social security benefits allotted to other laborers in Rome; being treated in a discriminatory fashion by managers because they came from the south, and therefore were regarded as second-class citizens; and routinely suffering health problems related to the toxic chemicals used in the factory’s processes to which they were exposed with any protection.
Pappagallo immediately launched protests, which prompted the factory owners to appeal to their protectors in Italy’s fascist regime, who in turn reached out to a Vatican official named Monsignor Ferdinando Baldelli, who would later become a key aide to Pope Pius XII. Baldelli told Pappagallo to stand down, telling him it wasn’t his role to be a union organizer, and that his efforts could disrupt negotiations between church and state to settle the so-called “Roman question.”
We have the letter Pappagallo wrote to Baldelli: “Monsignor, I see myself in the workers at the boarding house. They come from my land, and they’re immigrants too. The fact that they haven’t gone overseas doesn’t make their situation any less painful or difficult … The work in the factory is dehumanizing. I don’t find it just, and I can’t appease myself with arguments about politics, which don’t interest me at all. I only know that the faith, and a sense of humanity, don’t allow me to ignore my brothers, to whose service I’ve been assigned. If you’re not on their side, I can only say that I’m upset and confused.”
Baldelli promptly had Pappagallo removed from his position at the boarding house, with the idea that he would enter a training program for priests to serve Italian immigrants overseas and leave the country.
Despite that, Pappagallo managed to hang on in the Eternal City, eventually becoming chaplain to the Oblate Sisters of the Child Jesus, a post which came with an apartment near the great basilica of St. Mary Major. He transformed the apartment into a sort of halfway house for immigrants moving south to north, and eventually convinced the sisters to give him use of several other facilities in the area for the same purpose.
Thus when the German occupation of Rome began in September 1943, Pappagallo was ideally positioned to provide refuge for all those targeted by the Nazis. One priest friend who visited Pappagallo in late 1943 would note in his diary that the apartment was a “mezzanine full of refugees.” Many of those who took refuge with Pappagallo would escape the Nazis with false passports and other documents provided by two of the priest’s nephews, Gioacchino and Tommaso, who ran a nearby printing shop and who churned out fake papers by night for people sent their way by their uncle.
Eventually an informant tipped off the Nazis, and Pappagallo was arrested on Jan. 29, 1944. He was taken to the infamous Gestapo prison on Via Tasso, which today houses the Museum of Liberation. There he was tortured at the personal direction of Herbert Kappler, an SS officer and Chief of Police in occupied Rome, but refused to divulge the names of anyone else involved in sheltering targets of the regime.
Fellow inmates would later testify that Pappagallo always shared the meager amounts of food and water he was given with others, and that he acted as a sort of spiritual father for other prisoners, even those who didn’t share his faith. Two young communists, Aladino Govoni and Tigrino Sabatini, later said they’d been intrigued by his prayer book, and so he began explaining the psalms to them, thereby not only passing the time but giving them badly needed comfort.
When the time came to carry out the reprisals on March 24, 1944, Kappler put Pappagallo’s name on the list, and so he was herded onto one of several trucks that carried the condemned out to the Fosse Ardeatine for execution. On the way, he offered blessings and heard the confessions of anyone who asked.
Once they arrived at the site, one witness would later say, Pappagallo managed to slip out of the ropes with which the prisoners’ hands had been bound, raised his arms to the heavens, and blessed those who were to die and forgave those doing the killing.
After his death, Pappagallo helped to inspire the character of Don Pietro in Robert Rossellini’s classic 1945 film Roma città aperta. In 1998, Italian President Carlo Ciampi awarded Pappagallo the Gold Medal for Civil Merit, the country’s highest civilian honor, saying the priest had sacrificed his life “with serenity of spirit, a sign of his faith that always illuminated him.”
In 2000, Pope John Paul II included Pappagallo on a list of 20th century martyrs. In 2018, the Yad Vashem Holocaust Remembrance Center declared Pappagallo “Righteous Among the Nations,” recognizing his role in saving Jews during the Holocaust.
On this day 80 years ago, in other words, a priest went to his death who incarnated the burgeoning Catholic social consciousness of his day. While his executioners succeeded in ending his life, they obviously had no power to extinguish his legacy, which in many ways is the legacy of the social gospel in miniature — and which, arguably, is more alive today than ever.
Seemingly, less than half of the population of the UK believe that God even exists. It’s also likely that a good proportion of these non-believers have only a very sketchy understanding of Christianity or for that matter of any faith.
Heanor Cornerstone is a group of Christians from different backgrounds and traditions who’s mission is to present Christianity in a way that is accessible to anyone and everyone.
Part of their approach to achieving this is to produce a set of short podcasts starting from the most basic of questions: ‘Does God exist’. All sessions will be available on ‘Spotify’ and sessions will be posted here and elsewhere as they are published,
Never been to a Barn Dance? Can’t dance? The big advantage about this sort of dance is that the majority of us either don’t know the steps or have forgotten them. Every dance is demonstrated before hand and the ‘caller’ guides us throughout the dance . It really is fun for all ages.
The USA brand of evangelical Christianity is not renowned for its generosity of spirit or tolerance of any views which diverge from their own somewhat narrow outlook, so the following article came as a breath of fresh air.
A devout member of a congregation which held to the view that marriage was exclusively between a man and a woman and that any other ‘marriage’ was against God’s word and so was sinful, posed this question to her pastor, “My grandson is about to be married to a transgender person, and I don’t know what to do about this, and I’m calling to ask you to tell me what to do,”
The pastor answered: ‘Does your grandson understand your belief in Jesus?’ “. “Yes.” she replied. “Does your grandson understand that your belief in Jesus makes it such that you can’t countenance in any affirming way the choices that he has made in life?’ “Yes.”
He went on to say, “Well then, OK. As long as he knows that, then I suggest that you do go to the ceremony. And I suggest that you buy them a gift.”
The pastor went on to explain that Christians not attending such a ceremony could reinforce “judgemental” stereotypes the culture holds about the Church.
He said: “Well, here’s the thing: your love for them may catch them off guard, but your absence will simply reinforce the fact that they said, ‘These people are what I always thought: judgmental, critical, unprepared to countenance anything.” And it is a fine line, isn’t it? It really is. And people need to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling. But I think we’re going to take that risk. We’re going to have to take that risk a lot more if we want to build bridges into the hearts and lives of those who don’t understand Jesus and don’t understand that he is a King.”
The conversation was recounted on a podcast ‘Truth for Life’ . Within days American Family Radio took the decision to stop airing ‘Truth for Life’ after a 10 year association.
The Pastor had not compromised the views that he and his church held regarding marriage, but he gave a graceful and compassionate response to a lady who was clearly torn between the love for her grandson and her beliefs. Beyond that, his reasoning was sound and indeed scriptural. It would seem that this did not go down well with at least one Christian broadcaster!
Exactly what version of the Gospels do they read? Jesus associated with; adulterers, prostitutes, tax collectors (those collecting taxes for an occupying power and making themselves rich by overcharging), society’s outcasts, Samaritans (a people with what Jews considered to be heretical beliefs), the list goes on.
Christians are called to follow Jesus in every way. This most certainly means showing grace and compassion to those who don’t share our beliefs and above all, not putting barriers in the way of anyone coming to faith.
One of the greatest developments in science occurred – so the story goes – when Isaac Newton asked himself, ‘Why do apples fall?’ In fact, although there are an infinite number of stupid answers there are far fewer stupid questions and sometimes the most childlike questions are actually vitally important. Asking the question, ‘What does God want at Christmas?’ is therefore not as childish as it sounds.
There are two extreme views of God in this context. One view is that God can want precisely nothing: he is perfect in every way and so must be devoid of emotions. The trouble with this is that it is heading towards the God of the philosophers: an all-powerful being who is cold, dispassionate and utterly unapproachable, a He – or perhaps an It – who might be worshipped but cannot be loved. The other view is to imagine a God with limited powers but generous longings who is intensely frustrated because his desires cannot be met. The trouble here is that you are heading towards the God of the pagans who, while he might be loved, cannot be worshipped. The Bible balances the two views: that God is supreme and all-powerful but, at the same time, he loves and he desires. The result is that he can be both loved and worshipped.
So the question ‘What does God want?’ is a valid one. What does God desire? It’s easy to come up with things that we think God might want: peace on earth; justice; an end to hunger; the protection of his creation; and so on. Yet we find a clear answer about God’s priorities in Paul’s first letter to Timothy, where, in the context of living wisely, he says this: ‘This is good, and pleases God our Saviour, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth’ (1 Timothy 2:3-4, NIV). God’s priority is this one thing: he wants ‘all people to be saved’.
Notice that God doesn’t just simply want people to be saved, as merely wishful thinking. Paul describes God as ‘our Saviour’. Saviour is a word we will hear a lot in Christmas carols; it means someone who acts for us, who rescues us, who liberates us. That’s what our God has done: he is Saviour and if you want to know how he saves, Paul continues, ‘For there is one God and one mediator between God and humankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all people.’ The words could not be clearer. In Christ, God came down and became one of us so that he could represent both parties – God and humankind, become a ransom and, even, on the cross, a sacrifice. God wants us to be saved so much that he bent down, lowering himself from the highest heights of heaven to a cradle and then, ultimately, to a cross – a staggering descent from inconceivable glory to unspeakable shame.
Notice too that God wants all people to be saved. Don’t be distracted by thinking of criminals, crooked financiers, shady politicians or your neighbour. Think about yourself. You are included in that little word all. Have you realised that you are part of what God wants? Perhaps you responded years ago to God’s love for you but you have let the relationship grow cold and formal. Perhaps, though, that love of God in Christ Jesus is news to you and you haven’t yet accepted it? What does God want for Christmas? He wants you.
In Christina Rossetti’s poem, ‘In the Bleak Midwinter’, the last verse suggests that she too had considered the question, ‘What does God want at Christmas?’:
What can I give Him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;
If I were a wise man, I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give Him – give my heart.
Exactly!
May God be with you – and you with God – this Christmas-time.
Christmas isn’t just a matter of the baby Jesus being born in Bethlehem. It all starts long before that.
In the beginning God caused the universe to be created
Now we don’t want to get into a debate about the Bible versus science. This is really a non-issue. Science researches and reveals the mechanisms by which things happen but not why. God created the universe as an act of will. That’s the point. The time frame and the how is interesting but not central.
In the vastness of this universe our solar system including our planet came into being and became populated by living organisms including humans. Again the time frame isn’t important in the context of this article. Humans are unique in that all creation, certainly as far as we know. In what way? We were created with the potential to become like God himself, God caused us to have; the ability of abstract reasoning, a perception of right and wrong, freewill to choose and, most of all, what we call a soul, the essence of what we are existing beyond our physical being.
That’s where the problems started. Rather than following God’s plan, human beings began to use their freewill to go their own way, to choose the ‘wrong’.
Now God hadn’t created us as some sort of celestial experiment. He was heavily invested in us and desperately wanted and continues to want us succeed and to ultimately become like Him. Throughout history God intervened numerous ways (these can all be found in the Old Testament section of the Bible) but they all ultimately failed and humanity continued on its course of self destruction. So finally God decided to do the job himself.
This is where Jesus comes in. God became Emmanuel, which means: ‘God with us’ in the form of a baby born the a poor couple in an obscure town in the tiny corner of the Roman Empire.
He did this for two reasons (1) to live as a human being to demonstrate how we should live our lives (2) to rebuild the bridge back to God so that we could get across the gulf we’d created.
But that’s all a later chapter
The whole initiative is summed up in one of the best know passages in the whole Bible:
God so loved the world that He sent His one and only son that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but attain eternal life’.
Time is running out! Have you written all your Christmas cards? Decided who you are buying present for this year and what? What are the children and/or grandchildren into now? Where are those Christmas lights and why are they all tangled up again?
Of course the Christmas experience can be very different depending on each ones situation
The quintessential ‘happy family’ Christmas with everything running like clockwork, presents exactly what everyone wanted, excited but well behaved children, fabulous perfectly cooked and presented Christmas lunch, party games and so on is not everyone experience (does anyone actually manage to achieve this level of perfection?). For some, the financial burden of aspiring to this sort of Christmas is too much, for others, memories of Christmas’s past may bring sadness, for yet others, sitting alone with a ready meal watching the King’s Speech may be the extent of their Christmas. Or perhaps, children now live too far away and the best than can be hoped for is a phone call or for the tech savvy maybe Facetime or Zoom?
The thing is, Christmas doesn’t have to be according to what other people think it should be like or to conform to a media generated model. Why not create your own tradition whether it’s around a solitary Christmas or with friends or family? Nor does it have to cost an arm and a leg, however much advertising suggests that a ‘real Christmas’ means an expensive one.
And even if ‘church’ isn’t your thing why not take a break from the busyness and maybe experience the calm and emotion of a Christian Carol Service, Christingle, Midnight Communion or Christmas Morning Service?
Have a look at ‘What’s happening at All Saints’ and maybe join us for Christmas?
…….. and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid.
These words were spoken almost 3,000 years ago, looking forward to a time of hope where peace was the norm and everyone could live without fear.
And yet here we are, where wholesale slaughter of other human beings is perpetrated in the name of who has the right to ‘own’ which bit of land.
Prince Harry recently said in reference to his time in the military: “In truth, you can’t hurt people if you see them as people”. His comments were roundly criticised by the UK military but they are surely true – who but a psychopath could cold-bloodedly kill and maim other human beings simply because they were ‘on the other side’ unless he or she didn’t identify them as people with families, friends or aspirations but as ‘the enemy’?
On October 7th, Palestinian fighters committed unspeakable atrocities against unarmed Israeli civilian; men, women and children. In retaliation, Israeli soldiers and airmen and women have killed over 17,000 civilian men, women and children in Gaza, bombed hospitals and schools, restricted access to food water, energy and medicines.
How can the perpetrators on either side do this? Because they see war as nation against nation or faction against faction. They are conditioned to be blind to the suffering of individuals in pursuit of goals defined by their leaders.
For peace to prevail in the Middle East, Ukraine or in the numerous areas of conflict around the world, WE all need to see beyond the geopolitical manoeuvrings and national pride and insist that our leaders do all in their power to end wars even if doing so comes at an economic cost to us.
As Winston Churchill famously said: “Jaw-jaw is better than war-war”.
It is only when all humanity recognises that every human being, even those who we count among our enemies, is of immeasurable value and should be treated as such, that the peace envisaged 3 millennia ago will be realised.
No – it will not happen in a day or even a year or a decade but it has to start somewhere and some time. Why not here? Why not now?
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