The village of Nain on the northern slope of Jebel Dahi owes its fame to the Gospel: it is remembered only because it is where Jesus resuscitated the widow’s son.
The Franciscans of the Holy Land, not without many difficulties brilliantly described by M. Sodar de Vaulx (translation by Father E. Crivalli, Milan 1891, pp. 473-475). were able to buy the ruins and build a church in Nain.
A report written at that time and published in the Osservatore Romano, and then in La Terra Santa of Florence (1st May 1882, pp. 94-95), also tells us of the men who successfully built the church: Filippo da Montaltoveglio, guardian of Nazareth, Fr. Giuseppe Baldi, procurator of the Holy Land in Galilee and Pacifico Saleh, dragoman of the Holy Land who took on the majority of the disputes with those who wanted to hinder this work. The narrator also recalls the “head of the village, a very honest Muslim with an excellent heart” who “allowed water to be taken from the only spring nearby and stones to be taken from its bed; all the water and stones necessary for a factory; moreover, they are very scarce there.”
