Giovanni Battista Scalabrini

During his pastoral visits, Scalabrini became aware of the scale of the emigration that was emptying the countryside of his diocese: between 1875 and 1915, nearly nine million Italians left their country, mainly for Brazil, Argentina, and the United States. Convinced that these migrants, often isolated and exploited, were at risk of losing their faith and their dignity, he made their accompaniment the major work of his life. On November 28, 1887, he founded the Congregation of the Missionaries of Saint Charles, known as Scalabrinians, in Piacenza, intended to follow the emigrants to their host lands. In 1889, he created the Saint Raphael Association for the protection of emigrants, and on October 25, 1895, he established the female branch, the Missionary Sisters of Saint Charles Borromeo. Beyond ecclesial action, he intervened with public authorities for legislation to protect emigrants. Anxious to know directly the living conditions of his dispersed faithful, he traveled to the United States in 1901, where he visited Italian communities, and then to Brazil in 1904. This missionary work, attentive both to the spiritual dimension and to the concrete needs of migrants, would earn him the title of "father of migrants."

Scalabrini's holiness unfolded in the daily exercise of his episcopal office, which he lived as a total service to the souls entrusted to his care. His spirituality was profoundly Eucharistic and Marian, nourished by prayer and adoration, and was translated into constant attention to the most humble: the poor, workers, the sick, and emigrants. A tireless promoter of catechesis and the formation of the clergy, he conceived the episcopate not as an honor but as a demanding spiritual fatherhood. His view of migrants, whom he considered brothers in whom the face of Christ is manifested, testifies to a pastoral charity ahead of its time. This reputation for holiness, already perceived during his lifetime, was confirmed after his death. The Church recognized the heroic nature of his virtues on March 16, 1987, a step that conferred upon him the title of Venerable and opened the way to his beatification. During the canonization, Pope Francis highlighted him as a model for bishops and for the entire Church, inviting us to look at the migrant "with the gaze of Christ" and to promote a culture of encounter.

The beatification process concluded on November 9, 1997, when Pope John Paul II proclaimed Giovanni Battista Scalabrini blessed in Saint Peter's Square. The miracle recognized for this stage was the unexplained healing of a nun suffering from advanced ovarian cancer. For the canonization, Pope Francis, after having received the favorable opinion of the cardinals on May 17, 2022, decreed on May 21, 2022, that the blessed would be inscribed in the catalogue of saints. Notably, the Pope dispensed with the usual requirement of a second miracle, considering that Scalabrini constitutes a model for the Church and bishops and wishing to "give a father to migrants." The canonization took place on October 9, 2022, in Saint Peter's Square, during a celebration where he was proclaimed a saint at the same time as the Argentine Salesian Artemide Zatti. His liturgical feast is set for June 1, the anniversary of his death.

The legacy of Saint Giovanni Battista Scalabrini continues above all through the two congregations he founded, the Missionaries of Saint Charles and the Missionary Sisters of Saint Charles Borromeo, present today on several continents in the service of migrants, refugees, and seafarers. Around these religious families, study centers on migration, reception houses, and pastoral works intended for uprooted communities have developed. A pioneering figure in the pastoral care of migrants, Scalabrini is honored as the "father of migrants" and recognized as their protector; he is also associated with the Diocese of Piacenza and his hometown of Fino Mornasco. His memory remains vivid in Piacenza, where his relics are kept, and his teaching on the welcoming of the stranger remains highly relevant in the contemporary magisterium. In canonizing him, Pope Francis presented him as a model for pastors and an intercessor for all those who, even today, are forced to leave their land.