Tears roll down the cheeks of Usov, almost 18 years old, Russian by origin but born and raised in Rome, who has a tattoo in the corner of his right eye. He was perhaps not expecting the force of the impact of seeing the Pope bend down to wash and kiss his foot. At first he joked along with a curly-haired, neck-tattooed comrade, masking his embarrassment with jokes about cold water and a bare foot. Then, however, when the Pope steps forward after shaking his hand, he bursts into tears. He takes courage after the Pontiff has finished washing the feet of him and nine other boys and two girls of Sinti ethnicity from the juvenile prison of Casal del Marmo. "Pope Francis, excuse me, can I give you something later?" he whispers in his ear, with a Roman accent. The Pope nods and smiles. He shakes his hand and kisses it. At the end of the visit to the penitentiary on the outskirts of Rome - where Francis wanted, as in 2013, to celebrate Mass in Coena Domini on Holy Thursday - thanks to a guard, the boy manages to hand over to the Pope two parchments.
Excited jokes and handshakes
Like Usov, the other young people, including a Muslim from Senegal, placed on an elevated platform to spare the Pope the effort of kneeling, were also moved. Francis, who was just discharged from the hospital a week ago, was wearing an apron and rolled-up sleeves, and stops with each one after performing the rite of the washing of the feet. He shakes hands, extends his ear to listen to their words and jokes. He makes jokes too, like to the Sinti girl to whom he says: "Ah, did they leave you two at the end?".
The most excited is Matteo, he has middle-eastern features, an unkempt black beard and, sitting in the centre, while waiting his turn, he makes the sign of the Cross three times, sending kisses towards heaven. He is a Croatian but has also lived in Rome for years. "Mamma mia, Pope Francis, I love you and I always pray for you!" he exclaims as he approaches Jorge Mario Bergoglio, resting his hand on his shoulder. Twice he stops him again, once to assure him that he always joins the Pope in prayers for peace in Europe: ‘This war must end’.
Fragments of stories
Everyone wanted to say something, but there and then not everyone could find the words. Like Samuel, 15, the youngest of the group, hair shaved down and a discoloured topknot on top. "And what can I say? I am happy yes”. He has been in Casal del Marmo for two months: “Let's say three”. Why? “Ehh, I almost killed three people... J'ho menato!' he also replies in Roman dialect. He asks to be photographed and tagged on Instagram: “Come on, I'll reciprocate the follow”. “In this part, you never see mobile phones, that's why they're attracted,” smiles a guard.
Michele, for two years and two months in Milan, and for the past six months in the IPM of Casal del Marmo, helps his companion. He is 17 years old, his eyes bright green, almost as bright as the blue rosary dangling on his black T-shirt. 'I asked the Pope for a grace... The grace to go out, I won't do it to him any more'. He is energetic, offering to carry the wheelchair on which the Pope makes his entrance into the chapel named after Blessed Pino Puglisi, the Sicilian priest who gave his life for boys like these, entangled in crimes big and small.
Tenderness
Everyone there at Casal del Marmo has dealt or stolen or used violence and attempted murder. The sensation, however, in watching them, in listening to the fragments of their stories and the naive pride with which they denounce the causes of their imprisonment, was one of great tenderness. A tenderness that the Pope restores to them with an ancient and always moving gesture. "You disarm everyone with this immense sweetness that brings us back to the essential," says the director Maria Teresa Iuliano. She too is moved, with the paper in her hand trembling on which she had jotted down the words to say to the Pope: "I want to thank you on behalf of everyone for this wonderful poem that you have gifted us today".
Crowds in the streets of Rome
The director welcomed the Pope on his arrival at the juvenile prison, arriving after a short 15-minute drive from Porta Sant'Anna, where two large wings of the faithful were shouting and filming the passage of the 500L with their smartphones. There was almost a stampede when in via del Mascherino the Pope made the car stop to greet a young man in a wheelchair. Then the car headed towards the Lungotevere, skirting the cars stopped at the traffic lights, among tourists shouting “Oh my God!” as they caught a glimpse of Francis' profile through the window.
The Pope's homily
The Pope crosses the threshold of this island inside Rome punctually at 4 p.m. Iuliano is standing, smiling, waiting for him outside the chapel. Inside, as soon as the car engines are switched off, someone exclaims: “He has arrived, shhh!'. Nearby is the chaplain, don Nicolò Ceccolini, very young (35 years old), a priest for a few years. Francis jokes with him: “You are the chaplain? But did you get your First Communion?". Fr Nicolò celebrated the Mass, presided over by the Pontiff, who delivered a short homily, centred on Christ's gesture of washing the disciples' feet. “It was slave labour. Imagine how stunned the disciples were... but He does it to make them understand the message of the next day that He would die as a slave, to pay the debt for us all.”
'Jesus is not afraid of our weaknesses'
“If we listened to these things of Jesus, life would be so beautiful because we would hasten to help one another, instead of cheating one another, taking advantage of one another, as the clever ones teach us. It is so beautiful to help one another, to lend a hand: these are human, universal gestures, but they come from a noble heart. And Jesus today with this celebration wants to teach us this: the nobility of the heart,” says the Pope. And echoing the doubts and feelings of the 50 or so young people present in the chapel from different ethnic groups and nationalities, he added: "Each of us can say: 'But if the Pope knew the things I have inside...'. But Jesus knows them and loves us as we are, and washes our feet. Jesus is never afraid of our weaknesses, he is never afraid because he has already paid, he just wants to accompany us, he wants to take us by the hand so that life does not become very hard for us”.
“In society we see how many people take advantage of others - Pope Francis goes on to comment -, how many people are in the corner and cannot get out. How many injustices, how many people without work, how many people who work and are half-paid, how many people who do not have the money to buy medicine, how many broken families, so many ugly things... And none of us can say: 'I thank God I am not like this you know'. 'If I am not like this it is because of the grace of God!'; each one of us can slip, each one of us. And this consciousness, this certainty that each of us can slip is what gives us the dignity – to listen to the word - the 'dignity' of being sinners. And that is how Jesus wants us, and that is why he wanted to wash our feet and say: 'I have come to save you, to serve you'”.
Rosaries, biscuits, chocolate Easter eggs
The choir sang songs during Communion, and when the mass ended the initial silence turned into a roar as Pope made his way to the door: “Papa, Papa, Long live the Pope". The guards calm down the boys gently and the enthusiasm has its full vent in the next stage, a long corridor of one of the 'palazzine'. First, however, Francesco stops in a hall where he receives two packets of pasta: penne rigate and mezzemaniche. These are two products from the bakery recently opened in Casal del Marmo. The idea, explained those in charge, came from the Pope himself when he visited the institute ten years ago and told the boys: ‘Don't let your hope be stolen’. Since then many projects have sprung up precisely to teach these boys a trade and perhaps guarantee a future outside these walls: barber courses, carpentry, even a workshop for rap music.
Words of hope
Biscuits in the shape of a cross were also made by the pasta factory. A packet was given to the Pope together with a wooden cross with gold lining, the work of the young people from the carpentry shop. The same ones shout and chant choruses, while Francis distributes rosaries to agents and operators and chocolate eggs to the youngsters, who lift them up like trophies. Voices echo in the yellow-painted corridor, someone kneels as the wheelchair passes by: “Thank you for this visit”. Francis smiles amused. Then he stops to greet the director and the commandant again: “Our motto is to restore back hope,” says the latter, “you with your great example have strengthened our hope and so you have helped us to give it back to these boys”. “Courage, keep going”, is the Pope's mandate. Finally Pope Francis, makes his usual request, before getting into the car after about two hours, as the sun was already setting behind the trees: “Pray for me. In my favour and not against”.
