The Guanellian reclamation of Pian di Spagna
by Bruno Capparoni
A dozen years had passed from the desired opening of the first house in Como, in April 1886, things were going well for Don Guanella: his nuns were growing in number and generous service to the poorest, while the first priests, gathered in an embryonic religious congregation, they began their journey; consequently the Guanellian foundations were growing, after the first expansion in 1894 in Milan with the opening of the Pia Casa dei Poor and some nursery schools.
But in September 1899 Don Guanella threw himself headlong into a new and certainly singular undertaking, such as the reclamation of that desolate land that extended between the upper Lake Como and the beginning of the Valtellina, called the Pian di Spagna, to recall that there ran the border between the past Spanish domination of the Duchy of Milan and the lands subjected to the Grisons. In that vast area the Adda had wandered for centuries before finding its way to the lake; once the waters had finally been conveyed through the Dubino canal, the area remained abandoned and uncultivated, although it could have borne abundant fruit and supported a large population.
Already in 1872, with his first publication, Essay on Family Admonitions for Everyone but Particularly for the Country People, Don Guanella had tried to counteract the phenomenon of peasant emigration, which reached enormous proportions in the years between the two centuries. While, like the most informed part of public opinion, he continued to wonder about the sad phenomenon, he also decided to take action: he thought of transforming Pian di Spagna into fields and pastures that would create wealth. He purchased a large piece of land from the state and together with other owners organized the reclamation of what was contemptuously called the vedascia, that is, a place of reeds and toads. The beautiful town of Nuova Olonio was born from this.
He began by rearranging as best he could the building of an old tavern called La Castella as a shelter, where he placed a priest, three or four nuns and some good children; nearby he had a wooden church built which on 4 November 1900, during the Holy Year of the Redemption, was dedicated to the Most Holy Savior. And since Jesus could not be without his Mother, in Nuova Olonio Don Guanella began to invoke Mary with a rather unusual title, that of Madonna del Lavoro.
Don Guanella and the Madonna del Lavoro
The titles with which Mary is invoked suggest many things about the Christian faith. Especially if it concerns the Marian devotion of a saint.
In the heart and on the lips of Don Guanella the first invocation to Mary was for the Immaculate Madonna, she who is "the sinless" and who had cheered the Church of the 1854th century with the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception in 1858 and with the apparitions in Lourdes in 1895. Then from XNUMX, with the development of his action as a founder and in reference to the religious family of the nuns, he also spread the title of Saint Mary of Providence in his Houses, borrowed from the Roman church of San Carlo ai Catinari , ruled by the Barnabites.
Instead, the title of Madonna del Lavoro was completely new and still today raises some questions about its origin.
Some clues can be found in the history of French Catholicism in the second half of the nineteenth century, full of initiatives in favor of the working class world. Even if a little from afar, we find a first reference in the title of Notre-Dame des champs (Our Lady of the Fields) founded in 1852 in Angers (Loire Valley) where Abbot Le Boucher had created a patronage aimed at young workers and had spread this invocation to the Madonna.
More convincing are Don Guanella's possible, but currently unknown, contacts with Catholic initiatives in north-eastern France in favor of textile workers. In Roubaix, on the border with Belgium, the Catholic industrialist Henri Bayart had created the brotherhood of Notre-Dame de l'usine (Our Lady of the Factory) within his factories. He was in close relationship with Léon Harmel with whom in October 1889 he organized the famous "pilgrimage of ten thousand" to Rome, made up of workers and industrialists, who had prepared the publication of the encyclical Rerum novarum in 1891. It seems that Harmel, the famous «bon père» (good father) of the weaving mill of Le Val de Bois (Ardenne), was aware of Don Guanella's projects at Pian di Spagna; in La Divina Provvidenza of November 1901 (p. 83) we read in this regard: «Leone Harmel encourages him and he [Don Guanella] certainly sets about the grandiose work [of the Pian di Spagna]».
Another possible source of inspiration is the initiative of the Parisian priest Jean-Baptiste Soulange-Bodin (1861-1925). While he was parish priest of Notre-Dame de Plaisance, in a neighborhood that was then growing dramatically due to the arrival of workers involved in the Exposition Universelle of 1900, he promoted the construction of the new parish church near the Montparnasse tower, dedicating it to Notre-Dame du travail (Our Lady of Work). The works took place between 1899 and 1901 based on a design by the architect Jules Astruc, who inside the building used a metal structure typical of the industrial buildings of the time. The chronological coincidence with Don Guanella's initiative at Pian di Spagna is very interesting.
But from these references we discover more of a possible consonance than a demonstrated dependence. Furthermore, a significant difference must also be underlined, that is, the French initiatives mentioned are aimed at the world of industrial workers, while Don Guanella dealt with the rural environment through the reclamation of new arable lands and the organization of agricultural colonies.
But then it was Don Guanella who "invented" the Madonna del Lavoro? It cannot be answered with certainty, even if Don Leonardo Mazzucchi, an illustrious Guanellian and historian, states that he was the first to propose this Marian title in Italy («Charitas», n. 123, June 1959, p. 23).
«Our Lady of Labour, protect, our people and our families"
If it is difficult to attribute the origin of the Madonna del Lavoro to Don Guanella or not, it is however certain that the sculptural group representing her, exhibited in Nuova Olonio for the veneration of the faithful on 5 May 1901, was designed entirely by him, who described its characteristics to the Milanese sculptor Giuseppe Nardini, who was tasked with shaping it with the poor material of plaster.
The fact is attested by a precious letter of his dated 16 March 1901 to the archpriest of Traona Giovanni Tam: «Dear Mr. Archpriest, if you want to see a beautiful group of the Madonna del Lavoro spread in Valtellina, send a model of men's clothes (doublet, waistcoat, short trousers, new or used cloth boots) to Mr. Nardini Giuseppe, via Fiori Chiari, Milan 32. But reminders on the same day. Of course I return everything and pay the expenses, but you don't delay even a day" (E 2547).
The image of New Olonius is completely different from the French one venerated in the Parisian church. There Mary is sitting on the throne and embraces the child Jesus, a small craftsman, while at the foot of her throne there are the symbolic tools of industrial work. Instead, Don Guanella chose to represent Mary according to the depiction of the miraculous medal and at the same time referred to the medieval iconography of the Madonna del Manto: the Virgin in fact extends her hands and her cloak to protect two workers, a young blacksmith and an elderly farmer who wears those traditional Valtellina clothes requested in the letter to Don Giovanni Tam. The French statue inspires veneration for the Mother of that God who was called "the carpenter's son"; that of Don Guanella conveys trust in the protection of Mary, close to the toil and pain of the workers.
Don Guanella continued to show attention and affection to the Madonna del Lavoro and later wanted to give her a worthy setting. The wooden church, humble and poor, was soon replaced by a beautiful brick church. He liked the Milanese church of San Vincenzo in Prato and asked the engineer Giovanni Battista Sartirana to reproduce it in Nuova Olonio. It was blessed by the bishop of Adria-Rovigo, Antonio Polin, on 15 May 1905.
During construction, something considered prodigious also occurred. While the workers were working to close the apses, a scaffolding fell and overwhelmed four of them, who remained incredibly unharmed and this was attributed to the intercession of the Madonna del Lavoro. On the following 29 October 1906, the new altar in Romanesque-Byzantine style, designed by the architect Federico Frigerio from Como, was blessed, in memory of the fortieth anniversary of Don Guanella's ordination to the priesthood, with a party to which he also invited his old companions.
Even after the death of the Founder, devotion to the Madonna del Lavoro was cultivated in Nuova Olonio. On 23 August 1942, at the height of the Second World War, the bishop of Como Alessandro Macchi erected the church into a sanctuary. At the end of the conflict they wanted to give greater prominence to the Marian sanctuary and it was decided to create a new simulacrum. The sculptor Vincenzo Moroder from Ortisei was commissioned, who with the utmost skill created an exact copy of the original wanted by Don Guanella in fine pine wood. The new image was placed under a large marble canopy (which however inappropriately modified the beautiful proportions of the interior of the church) and was solemnly crowned by Bishop Felice Bonomini on 3 May 1953.
The image wanted by Don Guanella, humble and small but infinitely precious for our affection, was adequately restored after various hardships and is now venerated in the internal chapel of the Nuova Olonio retirement home, dedicated precisely to the Madonna del Lavoro. To those who stop in prayer, continue to transmit comfort and strength, just as Don Guanella invoked for the workers, when in 1903 he wrote this prayer: «Virgin of Labour, who encourages and bless the poor farmer and the worker, ah! she listens to the pleas of those who turn to you, feeling herself falling under the weight of prolonged labors which barely provide for the needs of the family."
Even in totally different contexts, after more than a century these words are still relevant, while from Nuova Olonio the Madonna del Lavoro continues to protect and support those who earn their bread with the sweat of their brow.