(Shën Vlash) — There are journeys that begin long before departure and continue even after returning home. The pilgrimage to Albania, “In the Footsteps of the Martyrs,” was one of them.
A journey that began months earlier
A group of young people aged 22 to 35 from the dioceses of Foggia, Nola and Mantua, with different stories and motivations but a shared desire to set out on a journey, took part in the experience: some were seeking a deeper relationship with God, others were driven by curiosity to discover a land and its history, and others still simply carried questions in their backpacks. The trip to Albania was the culmination of the program “Connected… the art of weaving bonds by walking together,” which accompanied the group throughout the past year, guided by Sister Filomena Rispoli and Sister Maria Cancilleri of the Canossian Sisters.
From 25 July to 1 August, the young people were welcomed by the Canossian community of Shën Vlash, near Durrës. More than just a place to stay, it quickly became a home: five sisters, each from a different country (the Philippines, Argentina, Congo, Timor and Italy) welcomed them with a simplicity capable of breaking down every distance, letting them enter into the daily life of their mission and into the lives of the people.
It was through these encounters that the group began to truly get to know Albania.
A history marked by persecution
Behind the landscapes, the changing cities and the contradictions of a country racing toward the future, the young people encountered a history deeply marked by the communist dictatorship. For years every religious expression had been denied, places of worship closed or destroyed, and many people imprisoned, tortured or killed simply because they did not want to renounce their faith.
But history, when it takes on a face, stops being merely something read in books. This could be understood by listening to the testimony of Mr. Koll, 92 years old: in his face marked by time and in his words was the memory of someone who had lived through those years on his own skin: the pain for loved ones lost, the fear, the deprivations, but also a faith kept in silence and never completely extinguished. His testimony made clear how, in the darkest moments, it was often simple people who safeguarded what seemed destined to disappear.
In Shkodër, in the footsteps of the martyrs
The memory of the martyrs accompanied the group above all in Shkodër, in the places once turned into sites of imprisonment and torture. Here the story of Blessed Maria Tuci and of so many persecuted men and women placed the young people before a question that is hard to avoid: how much are we willing to put at stake for what we truly believe in?
The journey, however, did not only recount the pain of the past: it also showed a country capable of rising again.
An Albania that is being reborn
In the streets of Tirana, Durrës, Kruja and Shkodër, the young people encountered a young, lively Albania full of contrasts. Alongside the still-visible wounds of the past, they discovered the desire to rebuild, to move forward and to look to the future without erasing memory.
One of the loveliest surprises was precisely the discovery of coexistence between different faiths. Mosques, Catholic churches and Orthodox churches today tell of a land in which Christians and Muslims have learned to respect one another and, often, to share important moments of their respective traditions.
The testimony of Eralda Kasmi, a young Muslim woman, showed concretely how fraternity can be stronger than differences: she spoke of Christians and Muslims able to take part mutually in the joy of the festivals, from Christmas to Ramadan, without giving up their own identity. In those days, the word the group experienced most was precisely encounter: encounter with a little-known history, with a faith paid for at a high price, with people capable of welcoming without asking anything in return, with a different culture and, inevitably, also with oneself.
The encounter with Mother Sandra Maggiolo
Among the most significant encounters was the one with Mother Sandra Maggiolo, Superior General of the Daughters of Charity Canossians, present in Albania in those days for the canonical visit to the community.
For the young people, it was not only an encounter with someone who bears an important responsibility within the Institute, but above all an encounter with a woman able to tell, with simplicity, what it means today to live the charism of Saint Magdalene of Canossa and to feel part of a family that crosses countries, cultures and profoundly different realities. In her words the value of encounter returned several times: drawing near to the other without expecting them to be the same as oneself, letting oneself be questioned by their story, learning to welcome differences not as obstacles, but as a richness. A perspective that, after the days spent among Christians and Muslims and after getting to know a land marked by religious persecution, took on an even stronger meaning for the group.
Mother Sandra also helped the young people understand that mission does not simply coincide with doing something for someone: even before works come people, listening, closeness, the ability to walk alongside. And this is precisely what the group was able to see in the daily presence of the Canossians in Albania: in the education of the youngest, in attention to families, in closeness to those who are fragile and in the ability to share the life of the people.
It was particularly significant to see her meet the community not from afar, but by entering into its daily life. Children, young people, families and collaborators gave back to her, through songs, dances, testimonies and simple gestures of affection, the living face of a mission built day by day. That celebration was not only a moment of joy: it showed concretely how much a bond can arise when one feels welcomed, recognized and part of the same story.
Her testimony thus added another piece to the pilgrimage. After listening to the story of those who had defended the faith at a very high price, the young people found themselves facing a question addressed to the present: what to do with the freedom received?
Guarding the memory of the martyrs, then, does not only mean remembering what happened: it means transforming that memory into responsibility, choosing dialogue instead of closure, welcome instead of prejudice, closeness instead of indifference.
Perhaps this was one of the most beautiful takeaways from the encounter with Mother Sandra: it is not enough to cross places and listen to testimonies; one must allow what one has encountered to change the way one stands beside others.
Guarding memory, returning changed
The community of Shën Vlash, Father Geoffrey Bugeja, the parish priest, the Stigmatine Sisters, the Poor Clares, the Dominicans and all the people met along the way each added a small piece to this experience.
They were not simply encounters to be added to an album of memories: each one left something behind.
The group encountered poverty and contradictions, but also dignity, pride, hospitality and an extraordinary capacity to start over. They saw how precious freedom, often taken for granted, can become when someone tells what it means to have paid its price.
The young people had set out thinking they were going in the footsteps of the Albanian martyrs. In the end they discovered that those footsteps do not belong only to the past: they continue in the people who guard memory, in the communities that rebuild, in the young people who choose dialogue and in those who continue to believe that differences can become an occasion for encounter.
Perhaps a pilgrimage serves precisely this purpose: not simply to reach places, but to allow places, stories and people to reach the one who walks.
From this experience the group returned with small seeds to let germinate, and who knows whether one day the roads will not lead them back there, not only to return to Albania, but to find again a piece of what, in those days, Albania left inside each of them, and to live it with a new awareness.
Antonio Resta and Roberta Resta
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