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Presentation of The Life of Luigi Giussani by Alberto Savorana (McGill-Queens University Press, 2018) through eyewitness accounts by Father Pigi Bernareggi, missionary priest in Belo Horizonte, Brazil; Pier Alberto Bertazzi, former director of the Department of Clinical Sciences and Community Health, State University of Milan, Italy; Rose Busingye, founder of the International Meeting Point in Kampala, Uganda; Jonathan Fields, musician and composer; and Shodo Habukawa (via telecast), professor at Koyasan University, Japan; introduced by Fr. Julián Carrón, president of the Fraternity of Communion and Liberation; and moderated by Alberto Savorana, journalist, author of The Life of Luigi Giussani

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 Luigi Giussani considered Christianity to be a fact, a real event in human life, which takes the form of an encounter, inviting anyone and everyone to verify its relevance to life’s needs. This is what happened for so many people all over the world who recognized in this priest and leader, with his rough and captivating voice, not only a teacher to learn from, but above all a man to compare oneself with.

"What is man that you are mindful of him, and a son of man that you care for him?" (Psalm 8). No other question in life has struck me more than this one. There has been only one man on earth who could answer it for me, and he did it by asking a new question: "What profit is there for one to gain the whole world yet lose or forfeit himself? Or what can one give in exchange for himself?" (Matthew 16:26, Mark 8:36, Luke 9:25). I have never felt implicated in this way by another question, leaving me breathless, like this question of Christ’s! Only Christ takes my entire humanity to heart. It is the wonder of Dionysius the Areopagite (in the fifth century): "Who will ever be able to speak to us of the love for man proper to Christ, overflowing with peace?" I have repeated these words to myself for more than fifty years!

Alberto Savorana, The life of Luigi Giussani, McGill, 2018

Everything happened to me in a completely ordinary way, and the things that happened, as they happened, inspired wonder in me, because it was God who brought them about, weaving from them a history that was happening – and is still happening – in front of my eyes.

Alberto Savorana, The life of Luigi Giussani, McGill, 2018

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