Sergio Mattarella, President of the Republic
Don Luigi Di Liegro, Founder and Director of the Roman Caritas, has left signs that resist the passing of decades. Concrete works that still bring relief and comfort to the most needy and marginalized. Paths of friendship and sharing on which many people, many young people, have set out, following his example. Testimonies so strong and demanding that they represent a permanent challenge for the affirmation of citizenship rights guaranteed by the Constitution.
25 years after his death, his tireless work as a builder of solidarity, as a tenacious and coherent witness of those human values which are the foundations of life for the community remains an inestimable wealth for Rome and Italy.
Don Di Liegro offered and asked everyone to share. He indicated the dignity and rights of the poorest as a necessary horizon for authentic social growth. It promoted the meeting between solidarity workers so that their network and their values were clearly visible to institutions, politics and society. I extend my warmest wishes for today's initiatives promoted by the Foundation and I ask you to convey a cordial greeting to all the participants in the Conference.
Roberto Gualtieri, mayor of Rome
Don Luigi Di Liegro was an extraordinary person for the city, the country and humanity. A prophetic testimony, of the ability to decipher and read man, the presence of God and the future in people's present, as a reminder of the sense of responsibility of people and citizens.
Di Liegro said that if we don't start from the most fragile, even the biggest projects will fail and for this reason we, who have great opportunities for innovation to regenerate our city with the Pnrr and Expo, will not be able to seize them if we don't start from the rights of the most fragile and the weakest. The city would remain more torn and unjust and it would not be possible to modernize it.
We are trying in our policies to be consistent with this vision but we know that if we have to do more, we will never be able to do it alone, without a co-planning and activation network that expresses the social and civil capabilities of this city whose legacy It is part of Liegro, representing a resource for us and for the Romans
very important.
Erica Battaglia, President of the Culture and Work Commission of Rome Capital
He simply defined himself as a priest, but in reality he was much more: he was Don Luigi, builder of solidarity networks, radical thoughts and shared action in support of those in the city experiencing profound social hardship. On the 25th anniversary of his death, the Foundation that bears his name did well to remember him with a conference in the Protomoteca room in the Campidoglio. He was not only the founder of Caritas of Rome, but also a strong stimulus to a generation of volunteers and local administrators. He was the creator of the first network to combat the social emergency and proposed a method of action that went beyond mere welfare: he asked himself where the 'system' had failed to work on the causes of inequalities and social exclusion. In the famous conference on the 'Evils of Rome' he put down on paper the institutions' delays in interventions
benefiting people at high risk of social exclusion and on the outskirts. It was 1974, but that reference to the high and useful sense of the institutions is still valid. Monsignor Di Liegro once again urges all of us to 'be careful', as he said. To get our hands dirty, not to favor oases of peace, but rather strong places because they 'provoke solidarity and radical interventions'. As a municipal councilor of the capital I owe a lot to those words often unheard by politics and I truly hope that her words and works become an intimate heritage of anyone who holds a political office.
