ROME, April 22 (RIA Novosti) - An Italian priest has held the country's first mass in a slot machine arcade for a group of teenagers, in an effort to try and attract Italian youth increasingly indifferent to the church, national media said.
"The idea came to me as the youth are estranged from the church. The young people choose another way of life, other places for meetings and communication. This can be discos or gambling halls where they are without their parents and feel themselves comfortable," said Don Duilio Testa from the central Italian town of Trasacco.
The teenagers who were surprised to see a priest in an arcade stopped gambling and rushed to help the priest prepare for mass. Some of them even said they would like to read the New Testament.
"The holy mass was held in unusual silence and was heard with great attention," the priest said, adding that he planned to continue such experiments in the future.
