Don Maurizio Patriciello and The Mela D’Oro Award

 

 

Don Maurizio Patriciello and the researcher Cristina Russo are the protagonists of the year of the 9th edition of the Teleclubitalia Awads 2024 – The Mela D'Oro Award. The award ceremony for the four categories chosen by the editorial staff took place at the Teatro Lendi in Sant'Arpino on 5th February 2024.

In a crowded room and in front of political and religious authorities, including the mayor of Naples, Gaetano Manfredi, and others of the northern area of Naples, as well as the bishop of Aversa, Angelo Spinillo, the 9th edition of the Teleclubitalia Awards was characterized by unique features. Journalist/songwriter Francesco Mennillo and showgirl Fabiola Cimminella presented the award ceremony on the stage of the theatre Lendi. Among the guests of the evening, to entertain the audience, Dario Sansone and Massimo Masiello.

 Don Maurizio Patriciello and the Giuglianese researcher Cristina Russo - for her research on breast cancer - win "ex aequo" as "protagonists of the year". Let’s discover more about one of the two awarded, Don Maurizio Patriciello.

Don Maurizio Patriciello, a brave priest defying Camorra

 

Let’s take a step back to 2013 when, like a father worried about his children, he went and asked the prefect about the land on which many rumors were heard about asbestos. He did not know that, after that October 17, his story would change for the umpteenth time. He already made sense when, as a nurse, he served the suffering. He was a dedicated paramedic, working just 100 meters from home. Then, a car ride to a bizarre, renewed Franciscan, those who, out of obedience to poverty, barefoot, hitchhiked, had intrigued him. He himself, far from the Church for a long time. In the end, Patriciello, 30 years old, enrolled in Theology and then became a priest. 

The bishop sent him to the Green Park of Caivano, where there are 13 drug stores for a business of 100 million euros per year. A neighborhood that arose after the earthquake of 1980, a sum of poverty, from psychological to working and moral. There, you can smell terrible things. The suspicion is that industrial waste is being burned. Sometimes, due to the smell, it is not possible to celebrate Mass. In the summer nights, you cannot sleep, with the suffocating heat and the ball thermoconvectors. In one of these "vigils", the priest can't take it anymore. "It was 3 o'clock, I was sweating, I had to react." He opens the computer and writes on Facebook: "I’m Don Maurizio Patriciello, who can’t sleep for the stench?" Until 6:00, he chats with thousands of stinking citizens. The next day he went to the bishop: "Everyone is silent but we must react," he told Monsignor Angelo Spinillo, who had just arrived in the diocese in Aversa. And the fateful October 17 arrives when, despite himself, he bursts into the news of half the world. Articles translated into several languages for a diplomatic incident with the prefect of Naples, De Martino. Don Maurizio wanted to alert the authorities to the emergency of a nature raped by the flames and the poison that illuminated the Neapolitan nights. Instead, he is brutally silenced for his lack of respect: he had not given "excellence" to the prefect. 

Leaving the palace, he meditates: he has faith that the humiliation suffered is not in vain. And it is so. A girl hears the screams of the prefect and posts everything on the web. In two days, the public, journalists, and MEPs ask for De Martino’s resignation and talk about fires and buried waste. Power of the media. "We were instruments of Providence," the tireless priest smiled when, accepting an apology, he went to the prefect to give him a crucifix. A contemporary Franciscan foil to describe a stubborn man who does not want to be silent in front of the funeral of young people and boys of 10 or 24 years in disturbing increase.

Sitography

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Today's Blogger

My name is Giulia Cinti, and I am a 15-year-old student living in Subiaco. I am currently enrolled in the third year of the liceo classico. Besides my passion for ancient languages, I also enjoy studying modern European languages. In the future, I aspire to pursue a career in law and specialize in international law. I have a deep appreciation for art and culture, often visiting exhibitions, museums, and other places of cultural interest in my free time. Besides all that, I love dedicating my time to volunteer work at the canteen of the Community of Sant'Egidio in Rome