people-from-tuscany

"His own sanctity of life, severity of morals, and aversion to luxury made more resplendent his virtues and talents."

"Scholars have long noted that Angelico’s vision of Hell did not emerge from a vacuum. …His Hell is not the feverish grotesquerie of later Northern painters, nor the architectural labyrinth of Dante’s nine circles. Instead, it is a carefully staged moral drama, Dominican in its clarity, theological in its logic, and yet unmistakably shaped by the imaginative vocabulary of both Dante and ."

"A most distinguished representative of the middle-class Liberal doctrinaires of a policy too advanced for the supporters of the Holy Alliance, and too backward for the generation that was being prepared by Cavour."

"Verbum Caro: the son of God chose flesh and even flesh "in bad shape" like mine."

"In the Italian church there is a wealth of initiatives, aggregates, experiences whose action is not flashy but is of great value... a sensitivity to be revived and promoted. The ecumenism of charity is what is to be promoted especially in the ecclesial community of our time."

"In almost every article, two basic requirements are referred to: compliance with Brazilian laws and equal treatment with other confessions. So no privilege, no discrimination. Indeed, one may well say that with this agreement the Church further promotes religious freedom and facilitates legal relations with the State for other religious institutions."

"We welcome the news that the Holy Father will be in Prato with great joy. Our whole diocese is celebrating this event, which will mark our history: Peter will truly visit out Church and confirm us in the faith."

"The deserved, necessary and respectful welcome of people who practice other faiths and religions does not mean offering them space for prayers inside churches designed for liturgy and the gathering of Christian communities. They can very well find other spaces and places."

"I have dedicated 38 years of my life to the service of institutions, first in Italy, and then for 20 years in the Vatican, to the Roman Pontiff. In these years I have spent all my energy to ensure the service that had been entrusted to me. I tried to carry it out with self-denial and professionalism but feeling serenely like a "useless servant" who has done his little part to the end"

"Reciprocity is a fine thing. Complete reciprocity is obviously to be desired. But we must be realists. Today we cannot demand reciprocity on non-essential, marginal things, which sometimes not even Muslim groups who are a minority in their own countries enjoy. And I believe that the essential is the freedom to be able to practice one's own religion, to have a place of worship, to be respected as sons of God."

"There's a need for meeting, for dialogue, for shared commitment, so that, in a world that is by now rushing towards globalization, the different religions, with their specific resources, may fulfil the expectations of promoting some truly human values."

"The priest lives in constant spiritual tension, but the scenario in which he lives is anything but exhilarating. If he is unable to defend himself, he stumbles in the mud."

"Those who love the truth understand the truth better, understand it sooner, understand it more."

"There is a need for something else that only the priest, as a man of God, can give. Ultimately, it is God that man lacks."

"Pain undoubtedly frightens everyone. But when it is enlightened by faith it becomes a way to cut back selfishness, banalities and frivolities. What’s more, we Christians live pain in communion with the Crucified Jesus: clinging to Him, we fill our pain with love and transform it into a force that challenges and overcomes the selfishness that is still present in the world."

"(About the opening of the holy door) This is a great opportunity that God is offering us: let us all welcome it. A few days ago, I was in Loreto with Don Oreste Benzi and three elderly priests who were celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of their ministry. One of them said: 'The year 2000 is coming: what do you want to change? Don q:it:Oreste Benzi looked at us and replied: “There are five of us: if we five change, a lot will change”. So, we must take these words as an example: each of us can do something, each of us can give a little light, because each of us is an open window through which God's light can pass."

"There is a crisis of vocations, but first there is a crisis of life. Today, people no longer have children."

"Holy priests move history and set it on the right path."

"(About In vitro fertilisation) Let us look at how it is written, how the architecture of life is conceived. Looking at birth, at the conception of human life, we see that the human cell is composed of 23 chromosomes, which come from the father's genetic heritage, and 23 chromosomes, which come from the mother's genetic heritage, forming the human cell, which has 46 chromosomes. And all this composition takes place in the act of love that unites the father and mother, the future father and the future mother. This is written in the book of life; this is certainly the architecture of life, as conceived by the one who gave life. And even if someone wanted to say that there is no one who gave life, they must nevertheless admit that this is the architecture. So, faced with this reality, I ask myself: do we want to disrupt this plan? Do we want to disrupt this architecture? Does man have the right to disrupt this architecture? Is it possible that he can shatter this architecture to make life a laboratory product? Such a leap jeopardises the whole meaning of conception and, consequently – because an initial error has subsequent repercussions – the whole meaning of the human journey through life. We say: be careful! A mistake made at the beginning will ultimately have tragic consequences. I would add that today many people, even non-believers, are rediscovering ecology. That is excellent. What is ecology? It is the recognition that in nature – we say in creation – there are laws. And if man violates these laws, there is a repercussion, almost a rebellion of nature, because it has laws within itself. So are there no laws, no clear signs at the most important moment of human life, which is the conception of human life? And will breaking those laws, violating those laws, not have dramatic repercussions on the very life of the unborn child?"

"The gift of counsel prevents a perpetually adolescent life: it is a gift that makes us adults."

"There is no cause-and-effect relationship between celibacy and paedophilia. Paedophilia is a perversion, a disease, a fragility that is also found in married people."

"True theologians are saints: a recent and admirable example is Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, who reached a point of synthesis of all revealed truth and was proclaimed Doctor of the Church."

"Do grant, O my Lord Jesus, that when my lips approach Thine to kiss Thee, I may taste the gall that was given Thee. And when my shoulders lean against Thine, make me feel Thy scourgings. And when my flesh is united with Thine in the Holy Eucharist, make me feel Thy Passion. And when my head comes near to Thine, make me feel Thy thorns. And when my heart is close to Thine, make me feel Thine embrace."

"I am surrounded by a humanity that wants what everyone else wants. My isolated affirmation is a most serious crime."

"Rebel, because today society oppresses me and tries to prevent the free expression of my being, I use every weapon to fight it."

"You who are reading this can say that my prose is crazy, abnormal, as you have called my actions crazy and abnormal. But your judgment doesn’t interest me at all nor do I solicit it."

"Why should you care about the future? Why should you care about the progress of the people? Since you, who call yourselves anarchists, are sure to engage in a battle that is already lost for you before it has even started, since you will certainly not see the society of which you dream, and even if the people rebel, social conditions would not change for you and your rebellion would have to continue.So what’s the use of going down among a mass that cannot comprehend you since its conditions are such as to render you unintelligible to them? If you are rebel geniuses as you claim, you should not replace Christian self-denial and patriotic servitude with the altruism of the anarchist who sacrifices himself for a future he will not see and this for people who do not comprehend you."

"I am gathering all the agony of the world together. Anyone who has a hidden worm gnawing away inside him, anyone dressed in mourning for the ideal, anyone who laughs scornfully at the ruin of the mind, may come. I need my sorrow to become a flood, a storm."

"I envy the savages. And I will cry to them in a loud voice: “Save yourselves, civilization is coming.”"

"I, who have the strength and awareness to be my own motive force, will not be the little cog that is overwhelmed, annihilated by the heavy social gears."

"I am destined to pass through this world, wandering like an invisible meteor. Precisely because I am superior, I will have to empty the entire cup of sorrow and distress with no joy to cheer me. But the harsh intoxication of drinking from the chalice of sorrow is a superb pleasure that only one who tears his soul to shreds by himself, with his own hands, is given to taste."

"You complain to each other about the war when you yourselves are its authors, and it continues because you put up with it! But I flee from your putridity that would sully me. Proudly alone, I break the chains that link me to you and separate myself from the pack of mangy dogs, submissive to the shepherd. I will wander the world alone carrying my hatred and scorn everywhere. Alone in struggle."

"Cowardice, caressed by christianity, creates morality."

"We are deeply distressed and greatly worried when we hear that the savage Estonians and other pagans in those parts rise and fight God's faithful and those who labour for the Christian faith and fight the virtue of the Christian name. ... to gird yourselves, armed with celestial weapons and the strength of Apostolic exhortations, to defend the truth of the Christian faith bravely and to expand the Christian faith forcefully."

"Trusting God's mercy and merits of the apostles Peter and Paul, we thus concede to those forcefully and magnanimously fighting these often mentioned pagans one year's remission of sins for which they have made confession and received a penance as we are accustomed to grant those who go to the Lord's Sepulchre. To those who die in this fight we grant remission of all their sins, if they have received a penance."

"In the post-Roman West personal diplomacy was more normal, for instance when family members were vying to divide up a kingdom, as portrayed dramatically in the opening scene of Shakespeare’s King Lear. A notable example was the series of summits in Carolingian France after the death of Louis the Pious, particularly those at Verdun in 843 and Meersen in 870.The outlines of these territorial settlements were laboriously thrashed out months in advance by commissioners who surveyed the terrain and gathered toward the summit data. But plenty of scope still remained for face-to-face haggling by the principals—their in-person meetings guaranteed the agreements by an exchange of oaths and sometimes of hostages. On other occasions, summits concluded carefully prepared peace agreements, as when Frederick Barbarossa and Pope Alexander III met in Venice in 1177.This conference took place on neutral territory; others, as with late Roman practice, were conducted in the borderlands. In either case, the location was chosen to ensure the status and/or security of each ruler."

"...the news of his election continued to amaze Europe for news it was that a simple monk, without the sponsorship of faction or prince and known only for his piety, should be chosen as Pope. ... Despite the gloomy forebodings and despite his unworldliness Eugenius met his problems with sound judgment and serene courage. The temporal claims of his office were of little importance to the tonsured monk who always was, despite exalted rank, to set the routine of life by the frugalities and discipline of his Order. His obvious sincerity and goodness, the complete absence from his character of predatory traits or revengeful instincts, did not fail to have effect with the Romans."

"Certain of you, however, (are) desirous of participating in so holy a work and reward and plan to go against the Slavs and other pagans living towards the North and to subject them, with the Lord's assistance, to the Christian religion. We give heed to the devotion of these men, and to all those who have not accepted the cross for going to Jerusalem and who have decided to go against the Slavs and to remain in the spirit of devotion on that expedition, as it is prescribed, we grant that same remission of sin...and the same temporal privileges as to the crusaders to Jerusalem."

"We exhort therefore all of you in God, we ask and command, and, for the remission of sins enjoin: that those who are of God, and, above all, the greater men and the nobles do manfully gird themselves; and that you strive so to oppose the multitude of the infidels, who rejoice at the time in a victory gained over us, and so to defend the oriental church—freed from their tyranny by so great an outpouring of the blood of your fathers, as we have said,—and to snatch many thousands of your captive brothers from their hands,—that the dignity of the Christian name may be increased in your time, and that your valour which is praised throughout the whole world, may remain intact and unshaken."

"...a thing which we can not relate without great grief and wailing, the city of Edessa...has been taken and many of the castles of the Christians occupied by them (the pagans). The archbishop, moreover, of this same city, together with his clergy and many other Christians, have there been slain, and the relics of the saints have been given over to the trampling under foot of the infidels, and dispersed. Whereby how great a danger threatens the church of God and the whole of Christianity, we both know ourselves and do not believe it to be hid from your prudence. For it is known that it will be the greatest proof of nobility and probity, if those things which the bravery of your fathers acquired be bravely defended by you the sons. But if it should happen otherwise, which God forbid, the valour of the fathers will be found to have diminished in the case of the sons."

"Italy, it must be recorded with honesty, albeit bemusement, has produced few more remarkable individuals this century than Licio Gelli."

"Gomez: But in the meantime we know how these things go: he will end up being acquitted."

"Would Giulio Andreotti have been the true "master" of the P2 Lodge? For heaven's sake... I had the P2, Cossiga the Gladio and Andreotti the Ring."

"The P2 Lodge, until its dissolution in 1982 due to the Anselmi-Spadolini law, was a regular lodge of the Grand Orient of Italy, as attested by extensive documentation that passed between the grand masters Gamberini, Salvini and Battelli on the one hand and Licio Gelli on the other."

"We had Italy in our hands. We would never have wanted to attack, but we were like a sentinel, carefully ensuring that the Communist party should never emerge."

"[journalist:] what can you tell us about the carnages? I asked her who is behind the carnages. [Gelli:] but you see, there have always been these massacres here. And there always will be. Oh yes, because there is no order. And also in recent times, because in the early days there were no massacres. They possibly took place after '60; before 1960 they never occurred. It's from the '60s: and why am I talking about the '60s? Because in 1960 there was still a certain condition that the people had emerged from a dictatorship of fascism - call it the dictatorship of fascism - and the people had gotten used to working and had to go to work because otherwise they would have been punished and wouldn't have had to go on strike because with the strike it is not that it occurs; the strike makes people more poor."

"With P2 we had Italy in our hands. Then there was the Army, Financial Police, Police: they were clearly commanded by all people from the P2 Masonic lodge. [...] We never wanted to attack and we couldn't attack, but we were a sentinel to prevent the Communist Party from emerging."

"I think every citizen of Bologna has a reaction to that surname. It would have been good if he had never set foot in our country and our city."

"The real power lies in the hands of the holders of the Mass Media."

"It is not up to us to deliver judgments. Only God will be able to tell the truth."