We cannot but recall his intense search of relations between faith and literature, his collaboration with the San Fedele cultural center and with the journal Letture. Nor can we forget his various commentaries for the festive Biblical lectionary, in which, in entire fidelity to Biblical inspiration, he knew how to open horizons of light for all, Christians and non-Christians, through very short expressions, almost aphorisms, words like “arrows” (iacula), always full of tenderness, of mercy, and of patience.

I would like, however, to recall above all don Luigi’s humanity, that is, his spirituality, which appears in his books. Words said in freedom and of freedom, words of his intimate diary (never chronicles!), which shows how his life was always inhabited by friends, a true communion in friendship. He was so solitary, but never isolated, never alone! Certainly, these friends are all here now. Yes, we are here: those that are already gone, such as David Maria Turoldo, Camillo De Piaz, Nazareno Fabbretti, Ernesto Balducci, Abramo Levi, Michele DO, and we who are here present: I, a friend of his and of all those I have named, Angelo Casati, and so many others among you!

We have lived his friendship, this balsam in our life as travelers in search of a land that is always distant, we priests and monks who like to sing, as we used to do with don Michele Do, “Where there is charity and friendship, there is God!” All of us friends who liked to come together, to speak heart to heart, to listen to each other, to be together at table. How many times, speaking of the things of God, which are those of man, we listened to the words, the apophthegms of don Luigi, always a song to life, to good wine, to fragrant food… Don Luigi used to call us here, to Santa Maria al Paradiso, also for his people, for you his daily friends, and as long as he was pastor I used to come every year. For me it was something rare: in all these years I accepted to come to Milan for meetings only to him, to don Angelo Casati at San Giovanni in Laterano, and to Erminio De Scalzi, bishop and abbot of the basilica of St Ambrose.