The Headwork of Visciano

Between the cherry crop in June and the hazelnut harvest in October, the villagers of Visciano, high in the Samnite Hills of southern Italy, have plenty of time to think. So they take it. The plainsmen down in Nola choose to think the Samnite hill people are slow-witted. "Do you come from Visciano?" they ask anyone who is particularly slow of speech.

Most of the Viscianesi do not seem to mind, but it bothered the mayor of Visciano to be chief of a community so regarded. He badgered the government in Rome into replacing the mountain mule track with a real road down to Nola and arranged for a rickety bus to make the run once a day. But the people of Visciano thought he was slightly mad to wish them onto such a terrifying machine, and they stuck to their mules.

The mayor went to his friend the priest. "What is the good of trying to do anything for Visciano?" he despaired. Don Arturo, the priest, decided to try in his own way. In Piedmont he had seen Venerable Don Bosco's famed institutes for abandoned children, and he had noted that the Waldensians drew Protestant youth from all over Europe and America to build a summer camp in the Alps. "Are you going to let it be said that Protestants build better things than you?" he cried to the Viscianesi. "You have a reputation for never protesting. Are you going to let it be said that you also never build anything? Are things going to be built in the Alps but not around the place on Monte Vergine where the Virgin Mary appeared in 1597 to save Visciano from pestilence and hunger? Saint Francis, when he was building his monastery at La Verna, promised: 'He who gives me a stone will have reward for one stone--he who gives me two stones will have two stones' reward--he who gives me three will have fullness of blessing.' If every one of you carries a stone up to the hilltop, we can build a building for abandoned youth there, in a place where the Holy Virgin allowed her picture to be found for Visciano's good."

The Viscianesi understood Don Arturo very well. At once they began to carry stones up the hill, mostly on their heads. On May Day the village's few Communists joined them in a big procession that moved more stones than ever in honor of the Virgin. Even plainsmen from Nola admired the headwork of the Viscianesi and came to lend a hand from time to time in supplying material for an orphanage for 200 children from three to seven.

Last week Don Arturo raised his hand. "Well done, Viscianesi," he said. "We have all the stone we need." The new orphanage was under way, the Viscianesi were quietly pleased, and the mayor was happy to be mayor of such a smart town. "If more people used their heads this way," he said in praise of Don Arturo, "far more would be accomplished in the world. And there would be less talk."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.