Puerto Maldonado, Peru, Jan 19, 2018 / 14:01 pm
Fr. Pablo Zabala is a 70-year old Spanish priest, who serves in a remote part of the world: the Peruvian Amazon.
Most of the people who fill his church pews are gold miners and sex workers in Boca Colorado – an area that some are likening to the California Gold Rush. Before Fr. Zabala began serving in the Amazon, his fellow clergy compared it to Sodom and Gomorrah.
"God is in all parts," Zabala told them, saying he felt a calling to serve with "the life of the common people," according to the Associated Press.
Kabala, a former biologist, has lived in the Amazon for the past 24 years, 10 of which have been spent heading up the parish in Boca Colorado, part of the Madre de Dios region. Pope Francis visited the region's capital, Puerto Maldonado, on Friday.