“A Christian on the way out is not the one who travels the world without direction and without sense, he knows where he is going, is a life delivered.”

We started the day around the altar of the Lord, in community, next to the Daughters of Charity of the provincial house of South Spain.

Many of us knew that today we were going to a special place, a key place for VMY and our Vincentian charism.

At midmorning we step on the floor of La Atunara, marginal neighborhood of La Línea for some, and sacred land for many others.

At the Centro Contigo, two large projects coexist: the first, “Cerca del hogar” [Close to Home], which welcomes young adults who are not under the tutelage of institutions, in order to facilitate their insertion into the labor market. The other, the project “Estamos Contigo” [We are with you], which is a program of school support and prevention of absenteeism, and in the summer is a summer school for the youth of the neighborhood.

After lunch we approach “Hogar Marillac”, a house where patients with AIDS and a community of Daughters of Charity live. It is they who welcome us and present the project. In the little time we were there we could see God in each of the corners and faces. God does not forget them, we saw signs of brotherhood, service and much love between residents and Daughters of Charity. Moved by the fraternity of Hogar Marillac, we return to the Centro Contigo.

Afternoon, time to share with the young people of “Cerca del Hogar”, where they join older boys who over the years have gone through the project.

They are hard histories but — told in the warmth of the Home that has been created in this center — they sound like hope. As a finishing touch, we share inter-religious prayer, living proof that the differences that seem to separate us disappear when we pray to the same God of life. In this way, as a community we enjoy a Moroccan dinner that our brothers give us with typical foods of their land.

Day of meetings, reunions, hope and tolerance, but above all a day of God that unites us and inhabits every corner of this sacred land.

Follow this journey in this tag.