“It is with a heavy heart that I am moving from Einsiedeln to Zurich”

Ugo Rossi, 47-year-old vicar in the parish of Einsiedeln, is drawn from the monastery village to the city on the Limmat: “I would like to intensify my work on the street. I am not deciding against the parish, but in favor of an activity that fulfills me even more.»

MAGNUS LEIBUNDGUT

Is street work more exciting than parish work?

First of all, I would say that she is different. I have known parish work for over twenty years. Naturally, I find street work more exciting because it’s new to me. I experience street work as more urgent and colorful work: What is great about this work is that you automatically come into lively and direct contact with people. And it hardly causes any administrative work for me at the moment.

After two years of working in the parish of Einsiedeln, will the bishop just let you go? Bishop Joseph Maria Bonnemain is under great pressure due to the overwhelming shortage of priests. That’s why he doesn’t want me to drop out of parish work altogether. However, the city of Zurich also lacks pastors and vicars. And so I will take on a 50 percent workload in a Zurich parish. For the time being, I will continue to do the street work on a voluntary basis. In the future, there may be a small amount of work at the Incontro association, the sponsoring association for street work, for which I am already a member of the management committee. I have to see that I can make ends meet financially. The church should move towards the people again: Is this also in the spirit of the bishop?

This is not only in the spirit of Bishop Joseph Maria, but also of Pope Francis. The church urgently needs to move towards the people again – in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, who also went to the poor, outcasts, the sick and prostitutes. Which activities will be the focus of your future work in Zurich?

As a volunteer, you are sometimes very busy handing out food at the delivery point. There is hardly any time or space left to have a deeper conversation with those affected. But the regularity of the contacts creates a lot of familiarity. With a longer commitment, it will be possible to meet more people in our restaurant, the Primero. There is often more space for pastoral conversations and confessions. But even on the street, people not only perceive us as social workers, but also as pastoral workers. Does your work focus on social activities? Naturally, social activities are in the foreground. For example, when we help prostitutes when they want to get off. While the social welfare office refers to those affected as clients, they are friends for us: we meet people as equals, as brothers and sisters. We accompany them and help them – out of friendship. Social work and pastoral care go hand in hand.

How important is a new evangelization in your work? We have long lived in secularized times of prosperity in which the gospel has been lost. We have prosperity – why do we need a God? The gospel should be conveyed anew by living and proclaiming it. For example, the fact that children and young people hardly come into contact with the gospel has a lot to do with the families in which faith in the good news has evaporated.

Do you have the opportunity to announce the good news to the prostitutes and drug addicts in addition to the food delivery? Yes, in deed and word. The gospel is not only to be proclaimed, but also to be lived in the flesh and truthfully. I like to remember meeting a mentally wounded man on New Year’s Eve, who screamed his unbridled rage into the night. As a pastor, all you have to do is stand by this man, be there for him, listen to him. Apart from that: The food delivery on a rainy, cold evening is quite simply hard, backbreaking work. That requires a lot of dedication and perseverance. Would you like to compare yourself to Franciscan brothers like Leonard or Benno, who have been doing street work in Zurich for many years?

I don’t like making comparisons. But yes, their work was similar to ours. However, I am less of a religious and have no intention of entering a monastic community. Rather, I see my place out there in the world. But human beings are not made for solitude. So what I could definitely imagine would be to live in a priestly community in Zurich. I am also in discussion with the diocese leadership. Last year you did street work in Zurich as a volunteer. Will the diocese or the Zurich cantonal church finance your work on the street in the future? Our street work is supported and financed by the association Incontro. This association is independent and should remain so. It is funded by private donations. This also gives parishes and other church bodies the opportunity to make a contribution. In addition, the diocese has hardly any finances at its disposal. The city association, the merger of the city of Zurich’s parishes, supports our work selectively. Complete financing of street work, for example by the cantonal church, would reduce our independence. We don’t want to become civil servants, we want to remain street workers. Will you join Sister Ariane and the Incontro association? The Incontro association was founded in 2001 by Sister Ariane Stocklin. Together with the pastor Karl Wolf von Küsnacht ZH, she heads the association. The “Broken Bread Take Away” campaign is, so to speak, the origin of our work. This campaign has existed since 2017, when Sister Ariane, a consecrated virgin, and Pastor Karl Wolf began distributing packed lunches to the needy on Langstrasse in Zurich. Together with her and Pastor Karl Wolf, I will continue to manage the food distribution but will also be present in the Primero restaurant.

Has the situation of the needy in Zurich changed in the meantime? At the height of the Corona crisis and the unemployment that followed, we distributed up to 400 warm meals a day to the needy in the Langstrasse district in autumn and winter 2020/2021. Now the situation has improved somewhat: some have found work again. Meanwhile, we still distribute about 250 meals a day. However, the Corona crisis is not over – and certainly not the plight of the people. We stay with the people on the street and continue to provide them with material help in the form of food and spiritual, spiritual and human support. How can it be that poverty is so rampant in our rich country? Nobody has to starve in Switzerland. But many slip through the cracks. Sans papiers and rejected asylum seekers cannot register with the social welfare office. Then there are the working poor or seniors whose wages and pension are not enough to live on. They may not want to give up their freedom and shy away from going to the social welfare office because this is often accompanied by a great deal of tension. It is possible that they have had bad experiences with offices, support organizations or aid organizations. There are also people in the monastery village who live in need and misery: who cares about them? In a village community where everyone knows everyone, poverty is much less visible than in a city where things are more anonymous. The inhibition threshold is greater to come out as someone in need and get help. However, there is also poverty in Einsiedeln. The “Tischlein deck dich” campaign, which gives food to the needy, is proof of this. Again and again, those in need seek help directly from the parish of Einsiedeln or from the diaconal office of the Ausserschwyz deanery in Pfäffikon.

Her departure weighs heavily. What does the parish of Einsiedeln do if they can’t find a replacement for you? It is with a heavy heart that I am moving from Einsiedeln to Zurich. I would like to intensify my work on the street. I am not deciding against the parish, but in favor of an activity that fulfills me even more. Leaving wasn’t an easy decision – especially since I’m a creature of habit and find it difficult to adapt to change. But in the end I had no other choice: I had to follow my calling. This is primarily a matter of reputation rather than my own will. So that the parish of Einsiedeln has a little more time to find a successor for me, I gave notice half a year before my last working day.

“Broken Bread Take Away”: Ugo Rossi leads the volunteers on their tour of Langstrasse in Zurich. Photos: Magnus Leibundgut

The pastor Ugo Rossi comes from Puschlav and moved from Goldau to Einsiedeln in 2020: “Now I’m heading to new shores on the street in Zurich.” “The church urgently needs to move towards the people again – in the footsteps of Jesus.” “In a village community, poverty is much less visible than in an anonymous city.”