Vatican Completes Building Shower, Barber Facilities for Rome Homeless

The Vatican has finished building shower and barber facilities for the homeless and poor just off St. Peter's Square in Rome.

The facilities used to serve as comfort rooms for pilgrims and tourists but were recently renovated to serve the poor upon the order of Pope Francis, according to Vatican Radio.

The shower facility was commissioned by the Pope after he learned from his almoner, Polish Archbishop Konrad Krajewski, that homeless people in Rome didn't have any place to go to take a shower or have a haircut, Vatican Radio said.

Last October, after he came out of the Church of the Holy Spirit to hear confessions, Krajewski met a homeless man named Franco from Sardinia who told him that he turned 50 that day and he has been living on the street for a decade.

Krajewski invited him to dinner but Franco told him, "Father, I can't go to the restaurant with you because I smell," reported the Vatican Insider.

"I took him with me nonetheless. We went to a Chinese restaurant. During dinner, he explained to me that you can always find some food in Rome. What is missing is places to wash," the bishop said.

Franco told him, "Here no one starves to death, you can find a sandwich every day. But there is no place to use the toilet and wash."

That story prompted the Vatican to build the shower facility.

The showers are open for use every day except on Wednesdays when Pope Francis holds a general audience or when there are celebrations at St. Peter's Basilica or at St. Peter's Square.

Barber service offering haircuts and shaves will be available to the homeless every Monday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. starting on Feb. 16 with barbers in Rome and graduating students from a hairdressing school in Rome offering their services for free. They have already donated chairs, hair-cutting instruments, and mirrors, reports said.

Besides being able to take a shower, change underwear and have their hair cut, the homeless will also be given underwear and a kit containing soap, towel, toothpaste, brush, deodorant, razor and shaving cream for men.

Most of these kits were donated by private firms and individuals. This will be supplemented by purchases by Krajewski's office in the future.

Meanwhile, Pope Francis has ordered the distribution of umbrellas forgotten by tourists to the homeless people of Rome to shield them from the unusually rainy Italian weather, Ansa news agency said on Friday.

The head of the pope's charity office, Monsignor Konrad Krajewski, told Ansa 300 umbrellas left behind by tourists at Vatican museums had already been distributed in recent days.