CHAINS, DESERT AND FREEDOM- An interview with Fr. Luigi Maccalli SMA

The 17^th September, 2018 is a day that Fr Luigi Maccalli SMA will never forget. On that evening, a gang of armed mujahidin kidnapped him from the Mission, where he had lived and worked for eleven years, in the small village of Bomoanga, Niger.  

For almost two weeks he was taken by motorcycle across the border into Burkina Faso and then further on into the deserts of Mali.  This was the beginning of a long and difficult period of captivity, loneliness and suffering in the Sahara desert that lasted a total of 752 days.

Early hopes of rescue soon faded and he felt fear and despair as has captivity gradually became a perpetual scorching hot by day and freezing cold at night.  He slept under the stars with a mat for his bed and much of the time he was chained by his ankle to a tree.  No longer able to celebrate Mass, he clung to the Psalms and the Rosary. He found two small sticks that he joined together in a cross when no one was looking. Prayer was the space that made him free.

This remarkable video was recorded in SMA House Wilton in July 2024 during an interview with Fr John Dunne SMA.  Fr Luigi speaks candidly about his despair, his fears, how he coped and most important of all, about what he learned from his experience. 

The video is thirty minutes long and was produced and edited by Mr Paul O Flynn.