Reportage
In the hard-scrabble parish that made a pope
In the slum where Pope Francis walked the dirt roads and celebrated mass, residents remember an archbishop of uncommon humility. ‘We were not used to an archbishop like him, so little beholden to ceremony.’
“Villa 21-24” in Barracas is one of the largest working-class neighborhoods in Buenos Aires. About 100,000 people live there, a city the size of Udine or Novara in Italy. However, “villa” in Argentina is popularly known as a shorthand for “villa miseria” (shantytown), a term coined by a novelist, Bernardo Verbitski, which has been used since the 1960s to describe the kind of informal settlement with shacks that in Brazil is called favela, in Peru pueblo joven, in Bolivia ciudadela, in Venezuela rancho and so on.
The villa miseria in Barracas is one of the poorest in the Argentine capital, and many of those who live there met Pope Francis when he was archbishop. At the church of Virgen de los Milagros de Caacupé, Jorge Mario Bergoglio celebrated masses and baptisms. After the religious services were over, he walked through the dirt roads of the villa, stopping to talk to its residents who opened the doors of their homes to him.
Fr. Lorenzo de Vedia, the priest who has led the parish for more than twenty-five years, met Bergoglio shortly after joining the clergy and becoming a priest. “In my first years as parish priest, he supported me in moments of crisis as well, as can happen at the beginning with priests who are at the start of their journey. He was by my side with humanity and gentleness. When my mother died, he called me to offer condolences. The gesture deeply moved me,” says de Vedia, known as Fr. Toto. “We were not used to an archbishop like him, so little beholden to ceremony.”
“He was direct, he looked you in the eye. He listened to you,” he adds, arranging papers on the desk in his office. The walls of the room tell many stories: photos of those who passed through the neighborhood, images of the pontiff, a portrait of Maradona, and a blackboard on which the weekly Mass times are written. Since Monday, April 21, when Francis died, daily prayer times have been added to the usual services to pay final respects to the pope. The same is happening in Villa Carlos Mugica, another working-class neighborhood in Buenos Aires. Masses are also being held at the Metropolitan Cathedral and the Basilica de San José de Flores.
“As soon as the news spread that he had passed away, the residents of the neighborhood started coming here to pray. There was no need to make a formal call: they came on their own. That also happened when Bergoglio was named pope,” de Vedia adds, as his phone is ringing non-stop. In the blue-and-white-walled church, a Mass dedicated to Pope Francis is held every afternoon: turnout is very high, and the small building cannot accommodate all those who would like to enter and remain lined up on the sidewalk.
This parish has a history of resistance: it was founded by Spanish missionary Daniel de la Sierra in 1976, during the first months of the last military dictatorship. The city's then-mayor, Osvaldo Cacciatore, sent in bulldozers to tear it down, but de la Sierra stood in front of them to stop that from happening. When Javier Milei was not yet president, an open-air mass was celebrated in front of the parish in defense of Francis: during the election campaign, Milei, the candidate for Libertad Avanza, who was beginning to make his mark and rise in the polls, had called the pope “a representative of evil on Earth” and a “Jesuit who promotes communism.” The curas villeros (priests of the slums) took to the streets to support the pontiff. “There were 80 priests. It was a mass of atonement towards the pope after the offenses he had been subjected to,” de Vedia continued.
The movement of the “priests of the slums” has a long tradition in the country. Its roots go back to the Movement of Priests for the Third World (MSTM) born in Argentina in 1967. The Third World priests were actively engaged in social work, especially in neighborhoods on the periphery and those of the working-class neighborhoods. The movement was harshly repressed by the military dictatorship: its symbolic leader, Fr. Carlos Mugica, was assassinated in 1974 in Buenos Aires by Triple A, a far-right paramilitary organization. Other members were kidnapped, arrested or forced into exile, and the movement dissolved. Today its legacy endures in the visible initiatives of the curas villeros that Pope Francis has endorsed and supported.
“I think a significant part of his legacy is the Church as a ‘field hospital.’ As Francis said, the Church must get roughed up, because it is on the streets. It has to stand beside the poor, the forgotten people. We want to continue in this direction,” Fr. Lorenzo de Vedia concludes.
Over the years, a community has coalesced around the parish of the villa. Next to the church are a middle school and a kindergarten. People learn how to play a musical instrument in the chapel. Across the street, where the only bus to downtown Buenos Aires stops, there is a space for senior citizens dedicated to Pope Francis and a soup kitchen that provides a free meal every day. The regulars at these places have met Bergoglio and talked to him. Nelly Silvero is the cook at the comedor popular (soup kitchen). As she prepares the dinner, which will be served in the late afternoon, she recounts that every December 8 Bergoglio used to come to the neighborhood to celebrate a mass in honor of the Virgen de los Milagros de Caacupé, the national patron saint of Paraguay.
In the neighborhood, where there is a large Paraguayan community and where Spanish is mixed with Guarani and many different accents can be heard on the streets, this particular Marian cult figure is a rallying point. “There was always a crowd. We were all fond of him and appreciated his simplicity. He would arrive via public transport, walk down the street and touch your head to bless you. He gave confirmation to my children, and I keep the photos of that moment at home,” he continued. “He knew about the work of our soup kitchen and sent us a letter from the Vatican thanking us.”
The soup kitchen is not the only space Bergoglio supported; he also provided support for setting up one more comedor popular in the neighborhood. The person managing it is Mirna Florentin, a lawyer originally from Paraguay: “I graduated in law thanks to a scholarship Bergoglio helped me get,” she tells us. Florentin is coordinating the Misión Padre Pepe association, founded in 2001 during one of Argentina's worst economic crises, which provides educational spaces for children and supports projects to reduce school dropout rates and promote social inclusion.
The association also works for addiction prevention and recovery. “There are many critical issues in the neighborhood: families are large and live in inadequate spaces. Many areas lack sewage, water, electricity. There are problems with safety and with drugs,” Florentin explains. “If the state and political parties are absent, the community will organize. And that is one of the legacies of Pope Francis: always being there to protect those who are suffering and in difficulty.”
Originally published at https://ilmanifesto.it/la-parrocchia-resistente-che-ha-fatto-un-papa on 2025-04-24