On Saturday 21 October we celebrated the 40 years of activity of the Camillian Training Center of Verona.
The proceedings were opened by Father Giuseppe Rigamonti, Provincial Superior of the Northern Italian Prov-ince, who reminded us, among other things, of how much the Archbishop of Milan, Msgr. Mario Delpini, is grate-ful for the three-year course in pastoral counselling conducted at Rho by the Camillians.
Father Virginio Bebber, CEO of the Opera San Camillo Foundation, reiterated the importance of the work of the Camillian Training Center and emphasised that today it is necessary for the care of the human formation of the health workers of our Camillian structures.
Councilor Elisa La Paglia, delegate of the mayor of Verona, brought greetings from the municipal administration, assisted by councilor Luisa Ceni, fond of the Camillians. Dr. Cirillo Stocco, professor of systemic counseling, demonstrated the participation of the president of the National Coordination of Professional Counsellors, CNCP, a national association that recognized our counselling programs in 2005.
The first presentation was by Father Angelo Brusco, founder and first director of the CCF, founded in 1983 at the behest of the Provincial Chapter of the Lombardy-Venetian Province to promote paths of personal growth, through the approach of the human sciences in the helping relationship, in leading working groups and teaching pastoral care in health, in particular the intensive course in Clinical Pastoral Education.
Father Angelo Brusco recovered the motivations that allowed the birth of the CCF, recalling when, fresh from studies in Canada and the United States, he wanted to establish the first courses, also open to outsiders, with a consistent participation from the diocese of Verona, to the point of also embracing students from abroad. The training programs have increasingly grown, contemplating the accompaniment of the dying and those who are experiencing the time of mourning. In recent years, the Camillian Center has promoted a free help desk, with the collaboration of the training team and the students in supervised practice.
The management of the Center passed in 1989 to Father Germano Policante who greeted the assembly with recognition and satisfaction, then to the late Father Flavio Danzi, who died last year. A special video message came to us from Father Silvio Marinelli, director of a similar center in Guadalajara, Mexico.
Father Pedro Tramontin, Superior General, offered us an overview of the current situation of the Camillian pas-toral centers in the world, while Don Massimo Angelelli, director of the National Office of Pastoral Health of the CEI, urged us to reflect bluntly on the current needs in the pastoral health care in Italy.
We awarded the diplomas to the students of the three-year integrated humanistic counselling course who com-pleted their course this year.
Monsignor Domenico Pompili, bishop of Verona, joined us during the buffet, testifying to his keen interest in learning about our structure and in supporting our training commitment which will soon see us involved in the pastoral care of the extraordinary ministers of communion and the Veronese priests who will be called to ac-company cancer patients to their homes.

Father Danio Mozzi
Director of CCF Verona