Foundation Antonio Emanuele Augurusa Presentation
Friday, June 11th at the Basilica of San Vitale and Companion Martyrs in Fovea: the presentation conference of the Antonio Emanuele Augurusa Foundation
It will begin at 6:15 PM on Friday, June 11th, with the Eucharistic celebration dedicated to the
feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, at the Basilica of San Vitale and Companion Martyrs in Fovea
at Via Nazionale 194 in Rome, the presentation conference of the Antonio Emanuele
Augurusa Foundation. The Foundation is named after a twelve-year-old boy of extraordinary
charitable and altruistic sensibilities, whose life was cut short in 1998 on a sunny summer
afternoon in a makeshift soccer field in the Calabrian outskirts, arranged, like in many other
forgotten areas of the world’s many “souths,” without any regard for basic safety rules. From
yet another innocent victim of a preventable and foreseeable tragedy in one of the many
neglected facilities meant for children, emerge the guiding principles of the nascent Augurusa
foundation: education and social inclusion.
Following the motto “Charitas omnia vincit“, the Foundation aims to direct its
mission and action toward integral human development, inspired and conceived by Pope Paul VI’s
Populorum Progressio, as “the promotion of every person and the whole person, in the
realization of the integral development of peoples.” In this perspective, the Foundation builds upon
Antonio’s particular inclinations, who was always especially sensitive to conditions of marginalization and
poverty encountered in his childhood, and his dedication to sports, for which he became a victim,
to the environment, for which he always showed an innate vocation for care and which requires
constant educational and cultural commitment, and to art, a field in which he immediately revealed
an evident passion.
To achieve its goals, the Foundation proposes an operational model based on
“generative restitution“, positioning itself as an active promoter and intermediary so that
corporate social responsibility projects, material donations, work services, and economic-financial
donations can converge in the concrete realization of high social impact works aimed at preventing
tragedies that still too often reveal conditions of unacceptable social hardship in the world. So that
those who have received more can give back more to those who, through no fault of their own,
have never had, putting into circulation and making their “talents” generative. Multiple entities from
the academic, business, and institutional worlds have already decided to embrace the “regenerative
model” proposed by the Foundation, including companies committed to developing more sustainable
and inclusive business models.
Following the Holy Mass, presided over by Monsignor Patrick Descourtieux, Head of Office
of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and Don Elio Lops, parish priest of the Basilica
of San Vitale, the Foundation’s chosen institutional headquarters, the scheduled presentations will
take place. Speaking will be the Foundation’s promoter and president, Francesco Augurusa, and
board member Renato Loiero, President of the Board of Trustees, engineer Francesco Saverio
Emmanuele Profiti, member of the Board of Trustees, who will explain the Foundation’s vision
and operational perspectives regarding Agenda 2030. This will be followed by presentations from
archaeologist Enza Zappone and Maurizio Misasi, President of the Riccardo Misasi Foundation –
Inheriting the Earth, regarding the historical role of the Basilica, and finally Paolo Fusaro,
General Director of Mieci Spa, and Emanuele Miceli, CEO of SIM Ingegneria, who will present
the renovation and enhancement project for the ancient side nave of the basilica, which will be
dedicated to Antonio Emanuele Augurusa, and is currently being studied through a partnership
between the Foundation and Mieci.
