On Saturday 14 December 2024 at 11.00 am at the Church of Santa Maria in Valverde in Palermo, the traditional pre-Christmas meeting of the Delegation of Western Sicily of the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George took place. Knights, Ladies, Postulants and friends not only from Palermo but also belonging to the Sections of Agrigento, Caltanissetta and Trapani (where meetings were also held pre-Christmas events, which we will announce in the next few days) participated. Following this, a confraternal meal was held in a restaurant adjacent to the church. At the end of the Mass, the Delegate, Nob. Prof. Salvatore Bordonali, Knight Grand Cross of Justice, observed that “the Christmas greetings see a Delegation that is growing and increasingly active. This circumstance brings us back to the idea of the nativity and in turn to that of the family, the natural community that is the basis and foundation of all the others.”
On 20 December 2024, the Delegate also sent to all the members of the Delegation a note of best wishes for Holy Christmas 2024, underlining that “this period of the year invites us to reflect on the fundamental values that unite us: faith, solidarity, family and love for others.”
The pre-Christmas Mass of the Delegation of Western Sicily was celebrated at the church of Santa Maria in Valverde (Piazza Cavalieri di Malta), which is just three hundred meters from the principal church of the Delegation, San Giorgio dei Genovesi. The Mass was celebrated by Monsignor Giuseppe Bucaro, Constantinian Chaplain of Merit, Director of the Cultural Heritage Office of the Archdiocese of Palermo, Parish Priest of S. Mamiliano Bishop and Martyr, and Rector of St. Catherine of Alexandria.
In his homily, Monsignor Bucalo first of all thanked the Knights, Ladies, Postulants and their relatives for their participation. Continuing, he said in summary: “The Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George today dedicates itself to promoting spiritual, cultural, humanitarian and socio-charitable actions in accordance with Christian principles, thanks to the fruitful activity of its Knights. A new gaze and a new heart are therefore necessary to recognize the paths of God and to respond with generosity and joy to the demanding call of his messengers. Not everyone is willing to understand it and, even less, to live it. We need to discover the intense love that guides God’s plans towards us and, if we are consistent with the faith and morals that Jesus reveals to us, we should not be surprised by hostilities, defamations and persecutions like those suffered by St. George the Martyr, who lived in the first part of his earthly life as a fighting Knight, then ‘resurrected’ to heal people and help the weakest.”
Following the Mass, the Delegate, Nob. Prof. Salvatore Bordonali, Knight Grand Cross of Justice, underlined in his remarks:
“First of all, thanks to Mons. Giuseppe Bucaro, who hosts us with our insignia in this ancient church dedicated to the Madonna, and for the beautiful homily.
The Christmas greetings see a Delegation that is growing and increasingly active. This circumstance brings us back to the idea of the nativity and in turn to that of the family, the natural community that is the basis and foundation of all the others. Thank you for attending in large numbers from Palermo, Agrigento, Caltanissetta and Trapani.
I would like to share with the confrères present a reflection due to a current event: the visit to Italy of King Felipe VI of Spain, which attracted a spontaneous, widespread and large-scale outpouring of sympathy. One might think that it was caused by the allure of the pomp of royalty; rather I believe that the feeling is also and above all to be linked to the rediscovered connection between man and the family itself, the one that dates back over time and that writes every day – as Monsignor Bucaro reminded us – the small and the big story. The non-elective natural institution, no one votes for the king, who still represents it in Europe in various civil contexts.
“For us Christians, the event of birth is linked to that of the resurrection, that is, on a secular level, to the rebirth of the Roman legal system into the Roman Christian one, where new and fundamental values converge, today, unfortunately, put in the shadows or opposed, perhaps using seductive concepts, but in a partial, ideological and misleading meaning. For example equality. But I don’t help my neighbor because he’s the same as me, it wouldn’t make sense, but because he’s different and yet he’s my brother. He too aspires to improve and I have the duty to help him in this; but at the same time, I have the opportunity to acquire merit, the one that leads to salvation.
“The allusion to the Constantinian Order is evident. Order, therefore not the chaos that precedes birth; Constantinian as inspired by the Christian values that the Emperor Constantine first instilled in it; of Saint George, who according to tradition is a Roman soldier and Christian, patron of knights, conqueror of evil.”
