This woman from Tenerife who has just turned 87 years old arrived at the Parish Caritas of San Bartolomé de Tejina in the 1950s when he was 17 years old. “Since she was a child she went to Church, my mother instilled in me to go to mass and catechism, otherwise there was no cinema”, she recalls.
Matilde began her relationship with the Social action first in the so-called Catholic Action and then with the “American Aid” distribution of milk and clothing together with “Doña Úrsula”, one of the first people to start with Cáritas in her parish. “My connection to Cáritas was due to my commitment to the parish, due to the desire to serve in whatever was needed,” says Matilde.
During all this time, Matilde has worked in the field of reception and assistance. This program is dedicated to responding to the basic and most urgent needs of the people who knock on the doors of the parish Caritas.
“For me, Cáritas is very special because it is about accompanying people who really need it. And the most beautiful thing has been the reception. I have been moved many times because people tell you their sorrows. They need to express what is happening to them and the important thing is to know how to listen to them”, he affirms.
Many of the people that Matilde has accompanied over the years have been young people with drug addiction problems. In this sense, she fondly remembers a young boy who, a few years ago after spending time in Tenerife, returned to his homeland, Seville. He “He stopped by the parish to say goodbye and told me: ‘I’m not here to ask for anything, just to give him a kiss and a hug, in gratitude for everything he did for me'”. For her, that kiss and that hug was as if it had been given to her by “Jesus Christ himself.”
70 years of volunteering have gone a long way. Matilde has gone through many times of crisis where the demand for help has increased. However, the turning point was experienced by the pandemic. “The pandemic has modified the action of Cáritas, because in many moments we have not been able to be close to the people; And it has been difficult, because for me the most important thing in Cáritas is the reception, being able to talk, smile and hug people ”, she underlines.
At 87 years old, and despite the fact that she has had to step aside in recent months, Matilde affirms that she will continue to collaborate with Cáritas “in whatever way she can”, contributing her experience and love.
“Because of my age and the situation in which the pandemic has left us, I will no longer be able to continue doing the same volunteer work as before, but I will continue to help as much as I can, because everything I do I do for my dedication to the Church to which I belong.
The work of welcoming and accompaniment that Matilde has carried out for more than 70 years, made even the parish community pay tribute to her on March 27, in recognition of all these years of dedication to the parish, as a catechist and as a volunteer of Diocesan Caritas of Tenerife.
“Being a volunteer is a vocation. You have to like it and have a lot of welcoming spirit to know how to understand people. Caritas is one of the most beautiful tasks of the Church”.
