“All of us, as judges, are ready to always stone someone who has made a mistake. I read on a wall in the city a sentence asking for eternal rest for Elena and eternal torment for her mother. I don't think little Elena would agree with those words , like any child ”.

This was stated by Monsignor Luigi Renna , archbishop of Catania, at the end of the homily on the occasion of the funeral of Elena Del Pozzo , the 5-year-old girl killed last June 13 in Mascalucia by her mother Martina Patti, 23, who is in prison after having confessed to the crime .

A touching ceremony. The coffin of the little girl arrived in the cathedral greeted by a long applause and a flight of white balloons. Hundreds of them were waiting for the hearse, in the churchyard a dozen wreaths and cushions of white, yellow, pink and orange roses. also two pillows with the words “The mothers of Hakuna Matata”, the school that the child attended, and “The teachers”.

The father Alessandro, grandfather Giovanni, aunt Martina Vanessa and grandmother Rosaria Testa accompanied the coffin in tears.

In front of the altar, a photo of Elena was placed on the white coffin. Before the function, the archbishop embraced the victim's family, then opened the homily with a passage from the Gospel according to Mark, in which he exhorted the parents " not to teach the violence of words to their children , neither on social networks nor on our walls already dirty enough. Because a child is not capable of conceiving vendettas, electric chairs, media gallows and, if he learns these things, he learns them from us. Let us strive to sow what Christ and every man of good will scatter abundantly: . Only in this way will there be no more funerals like this one ”.