Benedict XVI has sent a top Vatican official to the Basilica of St
Paul Outside the Walls to convey his concern for a group of Roma who had
sought refuge in the church after their camp was bulldozed by the city
of Rome.
Fr Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, said that
Archbishop Fernando Filoni, who is in charge of the general affairs
section of the Vatican Secretariat of State, had gone to “express the
closeness of the Holy Father to the group of Roma”.
About 100 Roma
entered the basilica courtyard and the church on April 22, Good Friday,
after city officials dismantled their camp on the edge of Rome.
The
camp was one of four bulldozed during Holy Week, displacing close to
1,000 people, including children, said the Rome diocesan charity,
Caritas.
Caritas Rome, working with a private charity, found
temporary accommodation for the group in the early evening on Easter
Sunday, Fr Lombardi said.
First, however, the Roma ate an Easter lunch
on the lawn outside the basilica.
According to Italian news
reports, there were moments of tension late on April 23 when the Vatican
police, who patrol the basilica and the property surrounding it, opened
the basilica for the faithful to attend the Easter Vigil, but tried to
keep a small group of Roma out of the church itself, directing them
instead to an adjacent room set aside for them.
“The behaviour of
the Vatican gendarmes was always proper and humane,” Fr Lombardi said.
They worked closely with officials from Caritas and Rome public safety
officers, he said.
Fr Lombardi said he hoped the temporary
accommodation arranged by Caritas would be the “prelude to a stable and
adequate” arrangement.
Social service agencies and human rights
groups particularly criticised Rome’s mayor, Gianni Alemanno, for
ordering the Roma camps to be dismantled without providing for the
people who would be made homeless by their destruction.
After
Caritas found housing for the group from St Paul’s, Mr Alemanno issued a
statement thanking the Diocese of Rome, but also saying the city would
continue to dismantle camps erected without permits and that it would
not provide alternatives for them because that could encourage more Roma
and other homeless people to come to Rome.