Giuseppe Girelli

The work of Father Giuseppe Girelli is inseparable from his pioneering and tireless commitment to the prison world, a vocation born under the inspiration of Saint Joseph Cafasso and encouraged by Father Giovanni Calabria. It was in 1933, during the Holy Year, that he felt a pressing call to dedicate himself to preaching to inmates. With the collaboration of a priest of the same name, Father Giuseppe Girelli (1875-1946), parish priest of Porto Legnago, he began his direct missions in prisons in 1934, notably at the Parma prison. To structure this apostolate, he organized the Pia Unione Sacerdotale per le missioni gratuite negli Istituti di Prevenzione e di Pena (Pious Priestly Union for free missions in prevention and penal institutions). The regulations of this union were approved by the Bishop of Verona on August 4, 1946, and the work received its official decree of canonical erection on November 25, 1955 (approved by Msgr. Giovanni Urbani). In order to maintain the link with the inmates and raise awareness among their families, he founded a bimonthly newspaper in 1947 entitled Croce Bianca (The White Cross). After leaving Rosegaferro in 1951, he founded the Casa San Giuseppe (Saint Joseph House) in 1954 in Ronco all'Adige, intended to offer housing, protection, and support for social reintegration to released former inmates. In 1957, a group of laypeople joined his work, giving birth in 1958 to the Sesta Opera (The Sixth Work) to support missionaries and prisoners materially and spiritually. In June 1959, his action was officially recognized by the Italian State: the Minister of Grace and Justice, Guido Gonella, presented him with the gold medal with a diploma of civil merit for Social Redemption. In 1961, the work expanded with the acquisition of a building in Mezzane di Sotto, named Casa di San Leonardo, to welcome former inmates who could not find a place at the Casa San Giuseppe. He also acquired about a hundred hectares of land with a rustic building and woods nearby, a structure named Mater Nostra (later sold due to financial difficulties). In 1971, he founded the Croce Bianca Social Assistance Secretariat as well as the Croce Bianca Secular Institute (Istituto Secolare Croce Bianca), whose goal is the personal sanctification of its members through the exercise of perfect charity and the visiting of prisoners, according to the word of the Gospel: "I was in prison and you visited me" (Mt 25:36). Until 1975, Father Girelli personally visited almost all the prisons in Italy.

The reputation for holiness of Father Giuseppe Girelli, already alive during his lifetime, prompted the diocese of Verona to open his cause for beatification and canonization in 2002. The diocesan inquiry into his life, virtues, and reputation for holiness was conducted with care, and the decree of legal validity for this inquiry was signed on April 27, 2007. The Positio on his heroic virtues was subsequently submitted for examination to the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints in Rome.

On January 27, 2014, Pope Francis received in a private audience Cardinal Angelo Amato, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. During this audience, the Sovereign Pontiff authorized the promulgation of the decree recognizing the heroic virtues of the Servant of God Giuseppe Girelli, thereby conferring upon him the title of Venerable. The cause is currently ongoing, awaiting the recognition of a miracle attributed to his intercession to pave the way for his beatification.

The spirituality of Father Giuseppe Girelli rests on an absolute trust in Divine Providence and on a boundless charity toward the most excluded. Inspired by the Gospel of Saint Matthew (Mt 25:31-46), he saw the face of the suffering Christ in every prisoner, affirming that the weaker, humbler, and more sincere a man is, the more the presence of God manifests within him. His legacy remains extremely vibrant today. The association "Don Giuseppe Girelli - Casa San Giuseppe - Sesta Opera" continues its work in Ronco all'Adige. In 2012, drawing direct inspiration from his charism of welcome and rehabilitation, the "Casa don Girelli" was opened in Ronco all'Adige to welcome and treat psychiatric patients who have committed criminal offenses (notably following the closure of judicial psychiatric hospitals in Italy), offering them a therapeutic and reintegration path unique in Veneto, characterized by a zero recidivism rate.