The Shoe-Manufacturing Consortium of Vigevano will present Pope Benedict XVI with one pair of shoes, while as many as 10 thousand pairs of shoes will be given to the Holy See for it to distribute them, through its missionaries, to the poorest countries, where the Church works through its missions: this was announced by father Federico Lombardi, director of the Newsroom of the Holy See, this morning during the press conference for the presentation of Pope Benedict XVI’s trip to Vigevano and Pavia, planned for Saturday 21st and Sunday 22nd April. “This is Benedict XVI’s first visit to an Italian diocese said father Lombardi , and especially Vigevano had not been visited by John Paul II “. “Vigevano is famous, among other things, for hosting, during his youth, the future Pope Saint Pius V who funded there the Collegio Ghislieri recalled father Lombardi and for being the birthplace of Teresio Olivelli, an activist of Azione Cattolica, director of the Collegio Ghislieri and martyr in the Nazi concentration camps at the young age of 29”. As to Pavia, the director of the Newsroom mentioned it is a university city and hosts some top-rank medical research centres, with Lombardy’s oldest university dating back to 1361. “Just think he said that Milan had its first universities, the Cattolica and the Statale, as early as 1924”.
