For four years now, the Franciscan convent in Tripoli has been organizing summer camps for the children of El-Mina, the port area of the city with its own municipality, called "Terra Santa Summer Camp".
The initiative, which has achieved widespread success, was created to promote interreligious dialogue and encourage the collective growth of the younger generations, regardless of differences, who instead acquire a positive and fundamental value for the wealth of the city. "Communion" and "promotion of diversity" are in fact the key words chosen by Father Quirico, the head of the convent, to describe the objectives of the summer camp. He, the friar continues, was inspired by the spirit of Pope Francis' encyclical Fratelli tutti, published in 2020 and immediately welcomed in his heart by the Franciscan together with his profound message of universal brotherhood.
Attention to diversity, however, is added to a strong social sensitivity and a charitable intent. With the 2019 crisis and immediately after Covid, the savings and salaries of Lebanese families were suddenly pulverized by the closure of banks and the enormous rate of inflation. The middle class disappeared and most of the population began to experience poverty. In this context, more and more children had to give up summer camps as well as school. Father Quirico thus decided to find a formula that could replace the paid summer camps, through a system that provided for a minimum registration fee (from $30 to $50), necessary to finance the activities, but which at the same time was very flexible, to meet the needs of the different families, so that only a small part of the families would find themselves paying the full amount and some others, instead, the service was offered free of charge.
A day at Terra Santa Summer Camp
But what does a day at summer camp look like? Children arrive from 8:30 a.m., until 9:00 a.m., when the service officially begins. Once everyone arrives, they are divided between those who play football and those who play basketball. The caretaker of the convent's sports facility, Amer, affectionately called coach by the children, teaches them the fundamentals of basketball: dribbling, shooting and passing, while Ibrahim, a Syrian chemist whom Father Quirico welcomed into the convent to help him with the work in the garden, plays football with them, improvising himself now as a referee, now a footballer, but only to help the team at a disadvantage.
The financial support of Pro Terra Sancta was fundamental for the construction of this sports center which consists of a room with a ping pong table, an air-conditioned judo gym, an outdoor basketball court and a synthetic football field covered by an insulating structure, so that it can also be used during summer days. Through the donations collected, Pro Terra Sancta was in fact able to finance Father Quirico's project, benefiting all the citizens of El-Mina, since the structures are separate from the convent and can be booked at any time of the day.
After an hour of movement, the children return to the garden of the convent and have breakfast with what they have brought from home around a large table shaded by a large canopy. Here Father Quirico teaches them songs and hand games or they draw under the watchful eye of Therese, a professor of the Faculty of Fine Arts of the Lebanese University (UL), linked to the Franciscan by a sense of deep esteem and friendship. Other games take place in a small room where music punctuates the movements and dances of the children, only to stop with them. This activity is directed by Samar, the housekeeper of the convent. Finally, the final moment of the day, the children return to the sports center for the judo lesson which ends with the arrival of their parents at 13:00.
A space for expression and sociality
The parents are quite enthusiastic about the service organized by Father Quirico and the only complaint concerns the duration, too short, of the summer camp: only one month, from June 17 to July 17. They learned about it thanks to Facebook, the websites of the various schools in which their children are enrolled, but also thanks to the more banal advertising sign hanging at the entrance to the convent. For them, the economic issue is certainly important, but what makes the experience at the Terra Santa Summer Camp truly unforgettable is the presence of experienced professionals, adults with full responsibility, who organize and manage the various activities for children. Particularly precious, then, are the religious differences, which reflect the confessional complexity of the land of the cedars and which find in the Franciscan convent a perfect space for expression and sociality.
In conclusion, it can be said that the Holy Land Summer Camp was a successful initiative, both for the Custody and, above all, for the children of Tripoli and their families. Father Quirico has already shown interest in extending the duration of the summer camp to 6/7 weeks to adapt to the other camps in the area and to fulfill the wishes of parents and, above all, of their children.
Article by Pietro Marchesani
Photographs by Giovanni Dinatolo
