VIDEO | Don Ciotti:“Do not separate ethics from beauty, and beauty is the mountain”

The reflection of Don Luigi Ciotti, founder of Libera, at the 101st CAI Congress

ROME - “We cannot afford to separate ethics from beauty, and beauty is that of our mountains”. Don Luigi Ciotti, founder of Libera, he says so in his speech from the stage of the 101st National Congress of the Italian Alpine Club - CAI, underway in Rome. “I was born in the mountains, in Pieve di Cadore”, continues Don Ciotti, and of the mountains "we must be proud, because we are people who, together, love the mountains and our country", which is united precisely by the high lands, "and I was pleased to find a bit of the Dolomites in the Aspromonte, because there is that type of rock."But, “how many words repeated and emptied of value, such as sustainability and green, everyone talks about it today, often forgetting our long past history, of our people, of the farmers, a history of coexistence that had lives in mind", says Don Ciotti, "communities born in solidarity, in the redistribution of goods, to cultivate better pastures and hay, but today we have to ask ourselves how much of this remains in the mountains."

So, we have to ask ourselves “because the mountains have allowed themselves to be adapted to the needs of the cities”, given that “some love it, others use it, and it is disposable”, continues Don Ciotti, “why this break with the life of the past and that of today, where are the essential services for communities, healthcare, schools, broadband?There are increasingly favored exceptions, but we need those services because their absence creates depopulation."And again, "why have the fertile lands been eroded by overbuilding which should not have been allowed, why does speculation now concern the large portions that are being asphalted and over cemented?", continues Don Ciotti, "but who are these investors who carried out these investments without controls on the origin of the funds because we have discovered the crime behind the liquidity for certain investments, and there are also those who give carte blanche to certain investors".

“We need renewable energy communities, cooperatives linked to ecological production, because if politics does not do this it is not politics, and other things”, continues Don Luigi Ciotti from the stage of the 101st CAI National Congress, “we need to encourage a new supply chain culture agriculture tourism and history, we need biodiversity but also cultural diversity and need other protected areas, we have young people who have studied, wonderful people, and would like to bring their talent to their lands", because “parks are extraordinary natural resources that must be protected and enhanced” and “what stops us from making more?”. Instead, concludes Don Ciotti, “the ski facilities are sufficient, there is no need to further disturb the environment” and "water returns to being a public good" and therefore protected, starting from the mountains that supply it to the valleys and the cities.