The Cardinals don't want a
McDonald’s outside the Vatican walls. Perhaps it's just another argument
about globalisation - something unItalian and "vulgar."
But the truth
is tourists deserve cheaper food in the area, writes Fr Alexander
Lucie-Smith.
McDonald’s, the fast food restaurant chain, is planning to open a branch on the small square next to the colonnade of Saint Peter’s in Rome. This small square once was the site of a bus terminus, and the restaurant would be on the ground floor of a building owned by the Vatican, which houses the flats of several Cardinals.
Their Eminences are not happy.
The Vatican owns numerous properties in Rome, many of which are rented out for peppercorn rents.
One assumes this is one of the things the ongoing financial reforms will address: That is, getting a proper return on these properties, which may involve dealing with squatters, or evicting those who have not paid rent for years, or negotiating with sitting tenants.
After all, the Vatican needs the money.
Hence, when McDonald’s comes calling, offering a very good rent for a prime property, well, it must be an answer to the prayers of APSA, the agency that deals with the Vatican’s holdings.
Italians, however, are far from enamoured of McDonald’s or indeed foreign food in general. Italy is the home of the “slow food” movement which aims to protect local culinary customs.
There is a perception in Italy that Italian cuisine, so dear to Italian hearts, is under threat from foreign imports like McDonald’s.
This perception may not be wrong.
So one can see why people may very well object to having something so unItalian so close to Saint Peter’s Square.
It strikes a discordant and dissonant note. It represents a new barbarian invasion.
Perhaps in the end the objection to McDonald’s is simply that as something unItalian and thus, one suspects, vulgar, it has no place just outside the walls of the Vatican.
But the truth is that there is a need for some sort of cheap and fast food outlet near the Vatican, as anyone who has ever been into one of the overpriced cafés on the Via della Conciliazione will testify.
And as for vulgarity, McDonald’s is a great deal less of an eyesore than all the traders selling cheap tat to tourists, whose stalls are just outside the perimeter of Saint Peter’s Square.