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On the sidelines of the conversation with the Calabrian Bishops, Professor Elena Beccalli, recently elected to the presidency of the Federation of European Catholic Universities (FUCE), will hold a public meeting on 11 September 2026, at 11.30 am, at the Pontifical Regional Seminary “San Pio Francesco Timpano, professor of Economic Policy at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Andrea Patanè, president of Alumni Cattolica, Angela Cristofaro, teacher, vice president of Uciim Soverato. Also present at the meeting will be Silvia Piaggi from the Giuseppe Toniolo Institute of Higher Studies (founding body of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore) and Federica Terzaghi, head of the Orientation and Recruitment service of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore.
The event was promoted by the Friends of the Catholic University Association, operating in Calabria with a network of members, delegates and assistants in each diocese, since the founding of the University, inaugurated in Milan on 7 December 1921 by Father Agostino Gemelli, Blessed Armida Barelli and a small group of Christianly committed religious and intellectuals who wanted to give life to the “University of Italian Catholics”.
From the beginning, the Catholic University was characterized in two aspects: its membership of Italian Catholics, from which freedom of teaching derived thanks to the autonomy of resources (the donations collected in particular during the University Day) and the national character of the institution, which although it was born in Milan, belonged by definition to all Italian Catholics. Peculiarities found in the documents of the time and in the promotion and support activities that reached even the most remote parishes of southern Italy.
In the following years, the faculties were created with offices in Piacenza, Brescia, Cremona and in 1961 the faculty of Medicine and Surgery and then the University Polyclinic in Rome, which was dedicated to the now deceased, also a doctor before becoming a religious man and priest, Father Agostino Gemelli.
Today, the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart with twelve faculties, dozens of degree courses, first and second level master’s degrees, is the largest Catholic university in Europe; the Gemelli Polyclinic is the first Italian hospital and among the first in the world for the excellence of care; borrowing the words of the Rector, Cattolica is committed to being “the best University in the world”.
The national vocation of the University, the historically demonstrated links between the Calabrian Church and the Catholic Church since its origins, the predilection for the southern dioceses of Armida Barelli (promoter of the “University of Paola” and inspirer of the civil commitment of many young Calabrian women, think of Alda Miceli and Maria Mariotti) and the attention to the many Calabrian students, will be the themes that will be revitalized and sealed during the first visit in Calabria of a Rector of the Catholic Church.