San Agustin Parish was renewed with contributions from the community and construction company.

The people of San Agustín Parish, led by Father Rafaelito, mobilized resources to enlarge the temple, with contributions that included construction materials from the work of the tunnel Semidei.

San Agustín Parish, located in the Loma Pyta neighborhood of Asuncion, is characterized by its highly religious community members who work side by side for the benefit of the church and the community. Father Rafael Tanasio, better known as Pa'í Rafaelito, is well liked and respected by those who attend his daily masses regularly.

Pa´í Rafaelito recalls that years ago, the parish was much smaller and needed major improvements in its infrastructure. "There were a lot of people at both Sunday and weekly mass, and the temple was very little," he recalls. It was then that he met with a group of community members and decided to take the challenge of enlarging and improving the parish, through various activities that included raffles and food sales.

The Semidei tunnel, which is located a few meters from the parish, was under construction during the same time, and both workers and engineers attended the weekly night masses, after finishing their work day, thus experiencing the lack of space first-hand. After talking with those in charge of the work, who were already made aware of the church’s situation by the workers themselves, they approached the parish to inform them that they would supply building materials to support the project. Bags of cement and lime, iron, crushed stone and sand came to the parish and greatly alleviated the costs of the project, allowing the work to be carried out more quickly.

Today, the parish has space to comfortably accommodate more people, and looks refreshed and embellished. "With this we managed to finish our temple, which is now big and beautiful," Pa´í Rafaelito adds, also stressing the importance of companies being in solidarity with the communities where they work. "It shows the solidarity of the company, when there is progress we must not forget the people." He also concluded: "It is very important to humanize the economy. As Pope Benedict said, when he visited us last year, we must progress without forgetting people".