Colombian diocese honored for serving Venezuelan migrants

The Diocese of  Cucuta, Colombia, has been awarded a Portafolio Award, an annual recognition in the country given to organizations and people promoting economic and social development.

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Highlights

By (CNA/EWTN)
Catholic Online (https://www.catholic.org)
12/4/2018 (5 years ago)

Published in Americas

Keywords: Colombian diocese, honored, serving Venezuelan migrants

Bogota, Colombia, (CNA) - The award is conferred by Portafolio, a business and economics magazine in Colombia.

The Nov. 29 award ceremony recognized the diocese's work to support Venezuelans crossing the border into Colombia to flee the worsening economic and social crisis in their homeland.

"Representing the diocese at the award ceremony were  Fr. Francesco Bortignon and Fr. David Cana Perez in recognition of the free services they provide at the Migration Center and the Divine Providence Casa de Paso (transit center) respectively," the diocese said in a November 29 statement.

According to the state agency MigraciĂłn Colombia, 1,032,016 Venezuelan migrants have settled in the country during the last two years, while another 853,480 have passed through while in transit to other countries.

The statement noted that Bortignon began the Diocese of Cucuta's Center for Migrants in 2016. In its first year the center provided hospitality and medical services to nearly 5,000 migrants.

Cana has coordinated the Casa de Paso transit center since 2017. To date it has provided more than 750,000 lunches to Venezuelan migrants, especially the children and the elderly.

The president of Colombia, Ivan Duque, presented the award to Cana

The priest explained that the transit center that he runs is located a kilometer from the Simon Bolivar International Bridge, which connects Cucuta with the Venezuelan city of  San Antonio del Tachira.

‽Today we distribute more than 8,000 lunches daily: 3,000 at the transit center, and throughout the entire city we have six soup kitchens where Fr. Francisco and the other priests are providing a service," he said.

Cana said that the award was the opportunity God gave him ‽to speak before a stage where the greatest businessmen in Colombia are present, on the actual conditions Venezuelans are living in, to invite them take a look at Cucuta, to innovate in this city, because we believe that blessings for the country are going to come through Cucuta, thanks to all the charitable works we are doing."

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.