Moments in my young days

But hearing Pius XI protesting loudly and, even more, seeing him weep, upset me so much that I fainted. I still have the memory of the window recess where I remained till the end of the audience when Monsignor packed us back into his roomy S.C.V. [Vatican City State] car – that he called coach – and told us to pray hard so the wicked would stop opposing the Pope «who has been too good with them»

Giulio Andreotti

Piazza Capranica, where the church of Santa Maria in Aquiro stands, in a period photo

Among the popular sayings of us Romans, during my young years, when one found oneself suddenly faced with something negative one was led to say: «Jesus mine, what’s going on?». To the church of the Gesù, instead, I was taken by the old aunt with whom we lived, to listen to the sermons of a very brilliant preacher who drew many faithful. If I had had to summarize them I wouldn’t have been able. However between the cleverly modulated tones and the great involvement of the listeners I, too, was gripped by an interest that was not ephemeral. I still remember my feelings in response to some topics: the friendship of Jesus with Lazarus brought back to life; the multiplication of the loaves and fish; the farmers who killed the tax collectors and the son of the owner to grab the land for themselves.
Compared to that oratory (which later I would have described as similar to that of the famous dramatic actors Ermete Zacconi or Ruggero Ruggeri) what I heard on Sundays from my parish priest – in the church of the Somaschi in Piazza Capranica – was an exercise as if for deaf-mutes. More than a comment on the Gospel of the day – as began to be done quite a few years later – he spoke about the Child Jesus; of the miracles; of Jesus who is moved and weeps. Above all I understood him without needing, unlike what happened with Father Venturini, to have almost all of it explained to me on the way home.
In the church of Santa Maria in Aquiro, in the early afternoon of feastdays, seminarians from the adjoining Capranica College, very highly thought of because brilliant churchmen had trained there, came to give catechism lessons to us.
Monsignor Carlo Respighi, Prefect of the Pontifical Ceremonies, was also a guest of the College and – I understood why later – was known as Ubique, that is everywhere. He was in fact prodigiously busy. Apart from his power to order the Pope to stand up or sit down, he was also Magister of the Collegium Cultorum Martyrum and as such presided at the “Lenten Stations”, that moved from Santa Sabina, on Ash Wednesday, to San Pancrazio, on the Sunday after Easter (it was then called in Albis, and now of “Merciful Jesus”). Don Carlo involved five or six of us, not only in those almost two months of the year, but also in other of his offices, including the solemn Papal ceremonies in Saint Peter’s and some events in the Apostolic Palaces.
So I began going back in full legality to where in 1927 we had been expelled after deviously insinuating ourselves into a pilgrimage of young Belgians. Pius XI described us, even if in good-natured fashion, as gate-crashers.

It took me ten years or thereabouts to understand what all that meant. For me 1929 was to remain memorable only for the curiosity of seeing the reopening of the Bronze Door that had remained half closed from September 1870 (the day the Piedmontese came, as Aunt Mariannina said)

Four years later, towards the end of May 1931, I was with Respighi’s small club in the hall of the Consistory at an audience for the faithful who had come to express their solidarity with Catholic Action, whose centers had been invaded by fascist organizations. At the time I had absolutely no idea what was going on, but hearing Pius XI protesting loudly and, even more, seeing him weep, upset me so much that I fainted. I still have the memory of the window recess where I remained till the end of the audience when Monsignor packed us back into his roomy S.C.V. [Vatican City State] car – that he called coach – and told us to pray hard so the wicked would stop opposing the Pope «who has been too good with them». It took me ten years or thereabouts to understand what all that meant. For me 1929 was to remain memorable only for the curiosity of seeing the reopening of the Bronze Door that had remained half closed from September 1870 (the day the Piedmontese came, as Aunt Mariannina said).
The catechism taught according to the so-called model of Pius X presented Jesus to us as the second person of the Holy Trinity; and they were not concepts easy to absorb. One was, however, attracted by the Child Jesus, not least because for Christmas we prepared at home, but also at school (mine was a state school), a little poem that we went to recite in the church of Ara Coeli on the Capitoline. Truth to tell the first two years I stood in line, but when I reached the steps turned back in fright. I managed it in 1929 and it was my first sortie from a pulpit. If I’m not remembering wrongly I repeated it once or twice.
The hour of religious instruction, stipulated by the Concordat, formalized the teaching of the catechism though it had already been largely imparted beforehand in the elementary school. When I went up to university in 1937 I had organic teaching in the Catholic Federation (FUCI) both in the Gospel Groups – with a cultured biblical scholar, Don Primo Vannutelli – and in the Conference of Saint Vincent that took us out to the suburb of Pietralata to offer a bit of help with the schooling of the youngsters. There I learned that Christ is charity, is love. Materially we could give little enough, except going over homework; but we received abundantly. I consider it a decisive moment in my life.
Another shaping factor was belonging to the Students’ Missionary League, the organization set up by the Jesuits to spread the work of the Church in far distant countries. I must say that, in this regard, I also deepened my geopolitical knowledge of the world in those meetings, more than at school. They also made us write short essays and many years later I could grasp better than many of my fellow politicians what was happening in Indochina, for example, an area I had been assigned by the League.
It is more than elsewhere by studying the missions that one approaches Jesus love, but the impact goes beyond this specific missionary angle.

The church of Santa Maria in Ara Coeli where the statue in wood of the Holy Child has always been venerated

I can’t hide that I have been disturbed more than once by reading that passage in the Gospel in which Jesus points out to a young man, who asks what path to follow, a way that frightens him and makes him flee.
Perhaps the priests with whom I have had relations all followed transactional models and they never asked me for what I was unable to give.
Apart from to the FUCI I owe a great deal to the Marian Congregation of Sant’Andrea al Quirinale, to which I belonged during high school. It was directed by a monsignor in the Secretariat of State (Antonio Colonna) whose training method I understood better afterwards. One reached Jesus through devotion to Our Lady, to the Holy Family also, giving Saint Joseph his due role. As for that, the frequency with which he would talk to us of Jesus, Joseph and Mary «rather than of Saint Anthony» seemed to me an extravagance at the time.
But Monsignor Colonna also had as leading idea the conception of Jesus love (Deus caritas est).
Later, when I found myself involved in political life, I found the confirmation of this centrality of love in two directions particularly: in the repudiation of any discrimination and in the obligation to cooperate in the development of the poorer countries.
For the rest, the more I go forward in years – and they are well beyond the expected – the more I do not forget at nights to recite the little prayer taught me by my aunt: «Jesus, Joseph and Mary, may my soul expire in peace with you».