On November 30, 33 years ago, the servant of God Father Giuseppe Marrazzo, a Rogationist priest who made his life a mission of charity and mercy, concluded his earthly experience. Almost half a century was spent in the sanctuary dedicated to Sant’Antonio, commissioned by Sant’Annibale, where the little great religious “sanctified himself with the faithful as a minister of reconciliation and consolation”, as recalled by the rector of the basilica, Father Mario Magro. Presiding over the mass was auxiliary bishop Cesare Di Pietro, who underlined the meekness of the priest and his natural aptitude for doing good even through humble listening and fraternal dialogue with anyone he met. “The sanctuary of Sant’Antonio is the spiritual clinic of Messina, of which Father Marrazzo is the doctor on call”: the phrase of Msgr. Francesco Fasola summarizes a common feeling around Father Marrazzo who had made charity the lever of his vocation.
And in his earthly life the great little Giuseppe Marrazzo committed himself to bringing Jesus into the hearts of those, large and small, penitents, sick and poor, who approached his confessional in search of a word of comfort, a smile and the sure hope that God would never forget them. The presence in the church, in addition to the Amici di Padre Giuseppe Marrazzo association chaired by Meluccia De Tommaso, of other prayer groups, testifies to the city’s bond of devotion with the religious man, proclaimed venerable two years ago. We are now awaiting the two miracles that will allow him to be proclaimed blessed and then sainted. At the end of the mass, the traditional floral tribute was held at the venerable man’s tomb in the basilica.