Justice & Creation

We welcome homeless people and others in need for a few hours on Saturdays, offering them sandwiches and hot drinks and perhaps more importantly an opportunity to chat and relax. Once a month we organise a Cinema Club. www.ndfchurch.org/en/solidarity   The Notre Dame Refugee Centre (www.notredamerc.org.uk) welcomes asylum-seekers and refugees in a drop-in centre for general support, a socialising space, providing immigration and housing advice, English classes, and free clothes and toiletries. 

The Shrine of Our Lady of Lourdes in Corso Francia (Turin), in addition to various liturgical and spiritual activities carries out charitable activities serving families in need and homeless people, approximately 250 people. This project is managed by a small group of volunteers who, welcome people for food and clothing distribution twice a week (Wednesdays and Thursdays). The service run in collaboration with the Piedmont Food Bank and local supermarkets. Thanks to the generosity of our supporters, we are able to offer a modest financial contribution to people who knock on our door for help. The most frequent requests we receive are for the purchase of medicines in the pharmacy, the payment of bills and telephone top-up costs. 

An agricultural project led by an Italian Marist, Luigi Savoldelli, sm. The project works with a group of local families, has its origins in Pope Francis’s Laudato Si’ encyclical. Luigi writes: “The work goes beyond cultivating the land or digging a well for water to quench the thirst of people, animals and watering crops. Beyond each initiative dedicated to those people who have little and are most vulnerable, there is the profound meaning to help them live better than they could have imagined. We create opportunities for a brighter future for about 35 young people and their families, so they are not forced to leave their homes and country.”

A weekly blog covering themes of justice, peace, and creation worldwide.