What should have been a celebration of the 50th anniversary since the opening of the facilities of the Jesuits’ Mount St Joseph Retreat House at Tarġa Gap, limits of Mosta, has surely turned out to be a hectic and serious concern over what future lies in store for this institution in view of the proposed development of a shooting-range next door.

It is necessary to voice my deep concern at what the Jesuits must be going through at the moment regarding the future of their beloved retreat house.

I am not one to be overly impressed by institutions for the sole reason that they happen to be run by the Church or by religious orders.

However, I must admit to being slightly positively-inclined towards the mission of the Jesuits in Malta. I have seen their apostolic zeal is naturally inclined towards striving to holistically empower all students under their care to excel in their abilities (St Aloysius College, in Birkirkara), their accompanying young men and women in their quest for truth in their academic studies (the University of Malta Chaplaincy) and the protection and assistance as they promote literacy and community development among the most vulnerable of society both local (Paulo Freire Institute, in Żejtun) as well as foreign (Jesuit Refugee Service).

Mount St Joseph stands as a beacon of quiet, offering an environment of prayer, of meditation or of quiet contemplation, even on matters that are not directly spiritual.

We, who have at heart the real well-being of society on these islands, need to give a vote of thanks and encouragement to these people who, completely selflessly and alien to the greed of money and votes, give of their best for the betterment of the Maltese and Gozitans, especially in the field of education and to our youth.

This is done also by providing the facilities at Mount St Joseph, which, in the words of the Provincial, Fr Patrick Magro, is being run “at a yearly [financial] loss”.

Mount St Joseph Retreat House stands for peace, silence and tranquillity in an otherwise overpopulated, heavily-commercialised and seriously noisy environment that Malta and Gozo have become in recent years. It is an oasis of peace that must be guaranteed.

A shooting range, next door to this retreat house is like sanctioning a betting office next to a school

Mount St Joseph has been standing there, offering its services far and wide – not just retreats but also conferences, meetings, seminars and other activities – for more than 50 years.

During these years, also, it has contributed in no small way, albeit quietly, modestly, towards what is now coined as religious tourism, which is a specialised niche in the field of tourism that was recently mentioned by Tourism Minister Edward Zammit Lewis.

And if the argument we put on fireworks factories’ existence is anything to go by on grounds that they were there before any encroaching development took place, then, certainly, we cannot put something next to Mount St Joseph that will very seriously damage its character of silence and tranquillity.

A shooting-range, next door to this house, is like sanctioning a betting office next to a school. The two simply do not go well together.

Let me be clear: I am not writing against the need of a new shooting-range; such a need is up to the authorities to decide upon. However, a shooting-range next door to Mount St Joseph simply does not make sense. We must find a way how to seek a locality elsewhere.

Improving on existing ranges, perhaps, or identify a place at Ta’ Qali, are merely two suggestions.

I am sure that Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, well-known, by now, for his penchant at finding solutions that meet everyone’s needs and himself a former student of St Aloysius College (who, therefore, should know what the Jesuits stand for) will be instrumental in finding a way out of this condundrum, which, actually, is quite unnecessary for the Jesuits.

We need to educate the people to understand that, while they have every right to freely enjoy their pastimes, it is simply unacceptable that by exercising such a freedom they impinge on the freedom of others.

And this is just what will happen if the proposed shooting range next door to Mount St Joseph had to materialise.

Franco Farrugia is a former teacher.