Posted on 12/24/2020 8:34:57 PM PST by xomething
On a pastoral visit to Sicily in 1993, Pope John Paul II called Livatino a “martyr of justice and indirectly of faith.”
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis has recognized the martyrdom of Rosario Livatino, a judge who was brutally killed by the mafia on his commute to work at a courthouse in Sicily thirty years ago.
The Vatican Congregation for the Causes of Saints announced Dec. 22 that the pope had approved a decree of Livatino’s martyrdom “in hatred of the faith,” paving the way for the judge’s beatification.
Before his murder at the age of 37 on Sept. 21, 1990, Livatino spoke as a young lawyer about the intersection between the law and faith.
“The duty of the magistrate is to decide; however, to decide is also to choose... And it is precisely in this choosing in order to decide, in deciding so as to put things in order, that the judge who believes may find a relationship with God. It is a direct relationship, because to administer justice is to realize oneself, to pray, to dedicate oneself to God. It is an indirect relationship, mediated by love for the person under judgment,” Livatino said at a conference in 1986.
“However, believers and non-believers must, in the moment of judging, dismiss all vanity and above all pride; they must feel the full weight of power entrusted to their hands, a weight all the greater because power is exercised in freedom and autonomy. And this task will be the lighter the more the judge humbly senses his own weaknesses,” he said.
Livatino’s convictions about his vocation within the legal profession and commitment to justice were tested at a time when the mafia demanded a weak judiciary in Sicily.
(Excerpt) Read more at ncregister.com ...
Good news. Probably more deserved than Pope Paterno from Poland.
I watched a documentary on him.
The mafia controls the construction unions.
They had a bomb built-in to the highway years before he was driving through and when he did they detonated it.
Pretty good (subtitled) movie from the 90’s, currently available to Amazon Prime subscribers (and on ad-supported Tubi TV), about the protection detail for Italian magistrates:
https://tubitv.com/movies/529451/la-scorta
https://www.amazon.com/Scorta-Claudio-Amendola/dp/B0773W4VN1
Sicilian mafia ping
Just above, I’ve linked a movie - from the 90’s - about the way Sicilian wise guys do their thing re shutting down investigations carried out by the few honest and fearless magistrates*. No death penalty in Italy, so magistrates kept getting planted, along with some of their guards.
* These were officials who, taking a cue from the French Napoleonic Code, combined the roles of judge and prosecutor.
BTW, Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year to you and yours.
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