Padre Antônio Luiz Marchioni, affectionately known as Padre Ticão, was honored with two permanent marks in the heart of the East Zone of São Paulo. The new Unified Educational Center (CEU) in Ermelino Matarazzo now bears the name of the representative of the cannabis cause and displays a 420 m² mural with his portrait.

The work was signed by artist Rafael Roque, a national reference in urban art linked to the medical cannabis agenda.

The mural, made possible with the support of the São Paulo State Department of Culture, celebrates the journey of a leader who broke barriers by taking a stand in favor of the medicinal use of cannabis. The painting was inspired by a photograph by reporter Fernando Moraes.

“Padre Ticão was a beacon for many families who still face prejudice and criminalization today. He brought light where there was fear. Creating this painting was an act of gratitude and resistance,” says Rafael Roque, the mural's author.

Standing at 20 meters high, the work portrays popular houses, representing his struggle for housing; a white dove, a symbol of his spirituality; and a sunset, a metaphor for the hope he nurtured.

In addition to the realistic portrait, the mural had the participation of artists Lukin and Gom. The trio used around 100 liters of paint.

CEU Padre Ticão: education and transformation

Located in the neighborhood where Padre Ticão built his path of faith and social justice, the CEU emerges as a space for education, culture, and living memory. The center can accommodate up to 7,000 people per day.

The structure features a library, cinema-theater, pool, court, skate park, recording studio, artistic classrooms, and is interconnected with a Municipal Elementary School (EMEF).

Padre Ticão's fight for medical cannabis

Still in his lifetime, Padre Ticão organized masses, seminars, and courses on the subject, welcoming families and engaging with researchers to break the silence surrounding alternative health in the outskirts.

In 2019, he founded a pioneering course on the cultivation and therapeutic use of cannabis, in partnership with UNIFESP and MovReCan. The goal was to teach in a popular and safe way, making the population less dependent on “market medicine,” as he used to say.

The priest's actions provoked reactions, even within the Church, but he remained steadfast. Today, more than 100,000 people have already participated in the courses he started, and the goal is to reach another 20,000 students this year.

Artist Rafael Roque vents about the imposed limits in the work. “Unfortunately, in this work I couldn't portray cannabis, which was part of Padre Ticão's life and struggle. The forced silence only reinforces the urgency of continuing to talk about it, as he always did.”

Ticão passed away on January 1, 2021, at the age of 68, but his legacy lives on, now stamped on the facade of a public center that carries his name and his story forward.