'Via Crucis' for diseased olive trees

(ANSA) - Vatican City, March 30 - Bishops from five Roman Catholic dioceses near Lecce will perform the traditional Lenten ritual of the Stations of the Cross (Via Crucis) on Monday in an evening walk through olive groves infected with Xylella fastidiosa, a bacteria that is withering entire olive tree plantations in Italy's southern Puglia region.
    The event, titled "A Gethsemane Without Olives" in reference to the garden at the foot of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem where Jesus prayed before his crucifixion, will proceed as a candlelight vigil for two hours on foot from Gagliano del Capo to the Sanctuary at Leuca.
    "With this Via Crucis, we want to appeal to those responsible at an institutional, social and political level to work together and find the right responses to a scourge that's affecting our territory," said Monsignor Vito Angiuli, bishop of Ugento-Santa Maria di Leuca, on Vatican Radio.
    Last Friday the differences over how to fight the scourge emerged during a meeting of the EU's Permanent Committee for Plant Health in which France, Greece and Spain pressed for more radical measures while Italy opposed them.