Highland Park to welcome special guest from Modena

The mission of the Sister Cities movement reflects the belief in the power of personal connections. Since its inception in 1956, the goal of Sister Cities International has been “peace through citizen diplomacy.”

As members of Sister Cities International and five time “Best Overall Program” winner, the Highland Park Sister Cities Foundation has embraced this mission. Through cultural, educational and business exchanges and programs to provide humanitarian relief, the Highland Park Sister Cities Foundation has connected people in our community with people in our sister cities: Puerto Vallarta, Mexico; Modena, Italy; and Yerucham, Israel. The results have transformed lives and created lifelong bonds of friendship.

And then along comes a serendipitous connection — a link we didn’t know existed, revealed through a series of miraculous events.

The president of the Sister City Committee in Modena approached our Foundation with a connection. “There is a priest in Modena who wanted to come to Highland Park.” The why is where the story begins.

We learned that the priest, Don Stefano Violi, is the director of Città dei Ragazzi, (Boy’s Town) in Modena, patterned after the Boys’ Town started by Father Flanagan in the United States.

Don Stefano will be leading a delegation from Modena to Highland Park on a pilgrimage. But, why Highland Park? As we would learn, they were coming to Highland Park to thank the community that gave birth to Don Sante Bartolai, one of their inspiring priests and benefactors.

Who was Don Sante Bartolai? He was born in Highland Park in 1917. He and his four brothers were orphaned and sent to be raised by an aunt in Sant’Anna Pelago in the mountains of northern Italy.

Three of his brothers returned to the U.S. Don Sante Bartolai remained in Modena and entered the seminary. He was ordained a priest in 1942.

His values and humanity led him to become an active member of the partisans in northern Italy called the Modena Underground Movement. He was captured by the Fascists who turned him over to the Nazis and sent him to Dachau and then to Mauthausen Concentration Camp, where he experienced unspeakable horrors.

He was liberated in May 1945 and was sent to a convent in Europe to regain his health. There he wrote his memoir, “Da Fossoli a Mauthausen.” Soon after, he founded Città dei Ragazzi — Boys Town of Northern Italy — based on Father Flanagan’s Boys Town.

He remained active in parish work, often returning to Highwood and Highland Park until his death in 1978.

As a result of his work with the Modena Underground, Don Sante Bartolai is inscribed in the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. as a righteous gentile a non-Jewish person who risked his/her life to save Jews during the Holocaust, a title officially awarded by Israel’s Yad Vashem to recognize extraordinary bravery and humanity, with names inscribed in Jerusalem’s Garden of the Righteous.

When Highland Park became Sister Cities with Modena, Italy, we had no idea of this deep and spiritual connection. The bonds of our Sister Cities relationship were strong, but now they are profoundly deeper. We are connected by a remarkable man who exemplifies the best in humanity.

Don Stefano will be conducting a Mass in tribute to Don Sante Bartolai at 5 p.m. on Jan. 12 at St. James Church in Highwood. He and his delegation will be recognized with a proclamation at Highland Park’s City Hall.

The delegation will include Don Stefano Violi, director of Citta dei Ragazzi; Fr. Simone Cornia, director of Youth Ministry of the Diocese of Modena; Dr. Massimiliano Morini, director of the vocational school of the Città dei Ragazzi; Dr. Elena Rocchi of the Youth Ministry of the Diocese of Modena; Enrico Bellini from the sanctuary of Fiorano in Modena; Marianna dalle Nogare from Sestola; and Antonio Verardi of the Musical Oratory of the Città dei Ragazzi.