Italian
ROME. — Justice, human dignity, and the model of Rosario Livatino were at the center of Step 3 of the 3rd Festival of the Whole Human, held on June 16, 2026, at the Pio Sodalizio dei Piceni. The session “The Eclipse of Justice, the Last Stronghold Against Interpersonal and Social Conflict” featured Antonio Baldassarre, Guglielmo Borri, Marco Sorbara, Francesco Caringella, Anna Gallucci, Francesca De Stefano Versace, and Francesco Paolo Sisto. Among the speakers was Domenico Airoma, Prosecutor of Naples North, whom we met on the sidelines of the proceedings.
What can be done for the human in the field of justice? Is there room for restorative justice?
First of all, I would like to remember Rosario Livatino in this context. The festival of the human, the exaltation of justice directed towards man and not towards itself, has had a precise reference in him, who with his life embodied this dimension of justice as prayer, as dedication to others and to the common good.
The brief news is that the Italian Episcopal Conference has approved the proposal to elect Livatino as the patron saint of Italian magistrates. We need a protector, a patron, to find our way and to know who the model of a magistrate is. A magistrate should not be a person entirely focused on themselves, self-referential, but should be aware, with great humility, that they must recognize what is due to others. Justice is giving each person their due. And what is “their due”? Dignity, first and foremost.
Dignity has become an increasingly subjective concept…
Exactly. If today this sense is so lost, if the dignity of man has become something evanescent, subjective, fluid, we need to recover it in an objective sense: what makes us human, what truly responds to the dignity of the person? If we recover this, restorative justice also makes sense. Why do we repair? We repair an offense. But we can only conceive the importance of repair if we understand that there is good and evil, that we have violated something that is part of the foundation of civil society.
Recovering the authentic dignity of man and the distinction between good and evil is the foundation for the judge to regain the authenticity of his function and for society to finally achieve peace.
Can ideological influences affect judges’ decisions?
Unfortunately, yes. Livatino said something very important: the judge must not only be independent, but must also appear independent. He must have a lifestyle that makes him seem distant from business and ideological power circuits. When I am called to judge a person, I must not bring any type of conditioning into my conscience. Justice is depicted with a blindfold for this reason: it must judge without being influenced, without seeking consensus or public approval.
The separation of powers is also fundamental — the distinction between those who accuse and those who judge. I believe this needs no explanation: anyone dealing with justice harbors the hope that those who accuse them belong to a different family than those who are called to judge them.
Are there concrete paths to repair for those who have committed a crime?
The current legislation provides for work and real reintegration pathways. What needs to be done now is adequate training for operators — primarily judges — to create the conditions for these pathways to be truly effective and widespread.
In previous years, there was an ideological mistake: the re-education process was built as something that responded to preconceived schemes. It doesn’t work that way. We need to understand that person, what is best for them, and what is the best they can do in relation to the community they live in. There must be a very realistic, very embodied dimension, without anything ideological.
3rd Festival of the Whole Human — June 16-17, 2026, Pio Sodalizio dei Piceni, Rome — suitetti.org
