The San Martín appeals chamber must define whether to continue the work of the Laudato Sí environmental center, which is the conversion of the largest garbage dump in the country. For the work to be resumed, it was the religious celebration that united residents of popular and private neighborhoods with recyclers and cardboard collectors.
next to the route 192, way to town open doorin front of private neighborhood “Haras Argentinos” you can see a shed made of recyclable material and on the side a dirt road. There, about 300 meters, you enter the Argentina’s largest garbage dump.
Despite the drizzle and cold this Saturday, July 8, about twenty people, including pilgrims from the Missionaries of Francisco, political activists and neighbors, came out with the image of the Virgin of Luján, and his caretaker, Negro Manuel, on a litter to join the mass at the entrance to the dump. After making a pilgrimage five kilometers they were received by the priest Sergio Gómez Tey. The altar was placed on a small table. Behind a stubble truck with a speaker was the sound support. Little by little, more residents arrived, including from private neighborhoods in the area, such as recycling workers, cartoneros, unions, political activists and even the local mayor, Leonardo Boto.
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The local bishop, Jorge Scheining, could not be physically present. But his message came through an affectionate letter with strong political content that he addressed to Sergio Almada, from the development society of the San Pedro neighborhood, the closest to the dump.
Shortly after taking office, the Archbishop of Mercedes-Luján visited the San Jorge chapel, the closest to the dump, and Almada went there, despite his mobility difficulties, to invite the highest Catholic authority in the area to learn about the largest landfill in the country. At that moment, the bishop entered the dump and saw the people working. “Women, children and men, some of them from the second generation… I saw them work in inhumane conditions,” read the letter Susana Luna, director of elementary school No. 3 a few blocks from the dump where several of the children who study in turn they work on what they call “burning”. The priest’s letter adds that the reconversion of the dump is a “noble and necessary” cause. This is a call to attention to the judge of Mercedes, Elpidio Portocarrero Tezanos Pinto, who endorsed the precautionary measure demanded by the candidate for councilor and agricultural businesswoman, Viviana Novelle, who paralyzed the work of the “Laudato Si” environmental center.
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The resident of the private Match Point neighborhood, Guillermo Orbegozo, also took the microphone, who reflected that “committing ourselves as citizens from an environmental and social point of view shows future generations that we agreed as a community to improve our lives.” Another of those who spoke was the recycler, Juan Monzón, organized in the Movement of Excluded Workers (MTE) who recalled that “at least 20 years ago the work should have been done.”
At the beginning of the mass, the priest Gómez Tey asked those present to especially ask the Virgin of Luján “because we are in her land. Let us pray and pray because God and the Virgin are with the poor and just causes.” The Gospel reading Luke 18:1/8 was dedicated to the judges, Today the case is appealed in Room II of the San Martín Chamber in charge of Néstor Barral, Alberto Lugones and Marco Morán. Jesus explains the persistence of a widow’s claim to an unjust judge.
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Then candles were lit. “Take them home and don’t stop lighting them because of the reconversion of the dump,” said the priest, who stressed that The environmental center is a project of the entire community of La Patria Chica, Luján, “For which we must fight as it happens to us for the great homeland and long live the homeland.” An evangelical pastor, Pablo García, asked for prayer so that the grace of God acts on the people who are preventing the conversion work from continuing.
After the religious celebration, he went on foot to the hill that is the beginning of the garbage dump today covered with new earth. About two blocks away, white smoke rises from thousands of garbage bags. Ivo, one of the members of the recyclers’ cooperative, explained the current situation of the landfill and the improvements in labor and environmental conditions of the new center stopped by the Mercedes judge. “We are going to have a nursery, bathrooms, a recycling belt, all the tools and conditions for our work, which is recycling, which includes the separation of the dry and the humid, there will no longer be burning and we project on this land that we are standing that it be a large compost bin and another part a tree reserve”.
It has been “burning” in the open for more than half a century. Pope Francis teaches that for the transformation of reality, prayer and struggle are necessary to attend to the cry of the earth and the poor.
@LSchaererOK
Source: Ambito
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