Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I am not a newcomer, you know, so I want to be judged for what I did when I was prime minister last time in Italy and president of the European Commission for more than five years.
Unfortunately, a certain type of Islam ghettoizes itself and is incompatible with our society. And it amazes me that some within the Catholic hierarchy act as if they do not understand.
If Macron thinks there is no immigration crisis in Italy, he should open his doors to the 9,000 migrants France agreed to welcome from Italy in accordance with signed European agreements.
Every mission constitutes a pledge of duty. Every man is bound to consecrate his every faculty to its fulfilment. He will derive his rule of action from the profound conviction of that duty.
The problem of Italy is not really a question of age. Japan has an older population, and it is now in full economic recovery. The problem is that Italy is old in the structure of the society.
We must now face the difficult task of moving towards a single economy, a single political entity .. For the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire we have the opportunity to unite Europe.
European government is a clear expression I still use, you need time, but step by step, as in the Austrian case, the European Commission takes a political decision and behaves like a growing government.
Love and respect woman. Look to her not only for comfort, but for strength and inspiration and the doubling of your intellectual and moral powers. Blot out from your mind any idea of superiority; you have none.
I am sure the euro will oblige us to introduce a new set of economic policy instruments. It is politically impossible to propose that now. But some day there will be a crisis and new instruments will be created.
John Paul II, above all, managed to contain the huge mass of frustration, of hate that had accumulated in that region, in favour of a peaceful transition. This was, without doubt, something that changed European history.
The problem of the Muslim presence is increasingly worrying. There are more and more clashes, more and more demands. And I doubt the compatibility of Italian law with Muslim law, because it's not just a religion but a law.
I can think that you are mistaken, but I have to be ready to give my life to maintain your right to make mistakes. I have to, though, have the right to say that you're mistaken. This is the principal of the liberal society.
If we look at Somalia, Ethiopia and Lybia, to how they're reduced now, and to how they were before, with Italy, I think that this page of history will be rewritten and there will be a positive evaluation of the role of Italy
If you ask me:"An openly homosexual teacher can work as a teacher? I say no. (...) I'll not do anything to discriminate you, but I'll also not do anything to put your type of relationship on the same level of the natural family.
The biggest problem in Italy is work. And out-of-control immigration damages the labor market because Italians can't compete with illegal workers who are being exploited. So to restore dignity to work, we must control immigration.
Relativism should be confronted where it damages fundamental human rights, because we're not relativists if we believe that the human being should be at the centre of society and the rights of every human being should be respected.
In actual fact, it is the State, i.e., the taxpayer who has become responsible to private enterprise. In Fascist Italy the State pays for the blunders of private enterprise Profit is private and individual. Loss is public and social.
We will work to modify and remove some European parameters, but regarding the euro, I remain convinced that the single currency is destined to end: not because I want it but because the facts, common sense, and the real economy dictate it.
Liberty, understood by materialists as the right to do or not to do anything not directly injurious to others, we understand as the faculty of choosing, among the various modes of fulfilling duty, those most in harmony with our own tendencies.
The laws imposed by Brussels damage Italian artisans, traders, pensioners, but hey, Europe is asking, so we have to obey. Come on, if Europe asks me to throw myself in a well, I'm not going to do that just because Europe is asking me to, am I?
A Country is not a mere territory; the particular territory is only its foundation. The Country is the idea which rises upon that foundation; it is the sentiment of love, the sense of fellowship which binds together all the sons of that territory.
Art does not imitate, but interpret. It searches out the idea lying dormant in the symbol, in order to present the symbol to men in such form as to enable them to penetrate through it to the idea. Were it otherwise, what would be the use or value of art?
I support non-discrimination for homosexuals, but I think, or at least I have the right to think - without saying whether I think it or not - I have the right to think, along with the catechism of the Catholic Church, that homosexuality is morally wrong.
With the same firmness with which I say that Iran represents a danger I tell Israel that you cannot and must not think of launching a pre-emptive attack because it would set the whole Middle East and the whole world on fire for who knows how many decades.
We apply the catechism by opening Italy's doors to women and children who come here legally on aeroplanes, but no more men on rubber dinghies. We will help them grow up and work in their own countries. Let's spend in Africa the money that needs to be spent.
On the other hand, I think that the family, the traditional family, has a fundamental social role, because it's there that children are born and the investment in children is the greatest investment a country can make. The benefits of this investment go to everyone.
I'm increasingly convinced that there is an ongoing attempt of ethnic replacement of one people with another people. This is not emergency migration but organised migration that aims at replacing the Italian people with other people, Italian workers with other workers.
If you search for poverty, you'll find it, often in the family. Why? Because the family makes this great investment, from which we all benefit, but for which no-one helps. We have to point the spotlight on the family, and make political choices that sustain the family.
If a citizen who's committed many crimes, instead of going to prison would say something against me or another politician, or against any other well known person ... I don't want to be disrespectful to anybody but someone who's killed twenty people could easily tell a lie.
The republic, as I at least understand it, means association, of which liberty is only an element, a necessary antecedent. It means association, a new philosophy of life, a divine Ideal that shall move the world, the only means of regeneration vouchsafed to the human race.
In ourselves, rather than in material nature, lie the true source and life of the beautiful. The human soul is the sun which diffuses light on every side, investing creation with its lovely hues, and calling forth the poetic element that lies hidden in every existing thing.
So when you are faced with a decision on the euro, it is not surprising that many people are confused. They still try to squeeze the euro debate into the old language. But deep down it is a matter of deciding where one's future lies. It is a matter of political will and courage.
The obscurest sayings of the truly great are often those which contain the germ of the profoundest and most useful truths. Genius rapidly traverses the living present to bury itself in the deepest mysteries of the universe; often making the grandest discoveries at a single glance.
If there are rights or duties of people which are not guaranteed because they're part of a [de facto] union and not of a family, there will be the need of a legislative action to remove the disparity. Obviously, when talking about people I refer to everyone [including homosexuals].
We form an association of brothers in all points of the globe ... yet there is one unseen that can hardly be felt, yet it weighs on us. Whence comes it? Where is it? No one knows ... or at least no one tells. This association is secret even to us the veterans of the Secret Societies.
If you don't want to call it a European army, don't call it a European army. You can call it 'Margaret', you can call it 'Mary-Anne', you can find any name, but it is a joint effort for peace-keeping missions - the first time you have a joint, not bilateral, effort at European level.
I want to highlight that Italy, every year, sends 6 billion euros in cash to Brussels. I cannot give these 6 billion euros to Brussels and then let them damage us on the fronts of agriculture, migration, fishing, commerce and finance. Why am I giving 6 billion to receive nothing in return?
The final objective is not to distribute the migrants among various European countries but to prevent them from entering Europe and from departing from Africa. We need to intervene in Africa. We need to have a Marshall Plan for Africa to improve living conditions in the countries of origin.
Love your country. Your country is the land where your parents sleep, where is spoken that language in which the chosen of your heart, blushing, whispered the first word of love; it is the home that God has given you that by striving to perfect yourselves therein you may prepare to ascend to him.
Are we all clear that we want to build something that can aspire to be a world power? In other words, not just a trading bloc but a political entity. Do we realise that our nation states, taken individually, would find it far more difficult to assert their existence and their identity on the world stage.
Good relations with Russia are great news. Putting a stop to the [Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership] is great news. Defending American industry against the invasion of Chinese products. Renegotiating the role of NATO. And a similar approach on the issue of immigration. This is all great news.
Statistics tell us that of the 500,000 people who arrived, those who are granted political asylum are more or less 10 percent. I mean those who are fleeing from war, from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, parts of Nigeria. Welcoming them, in all of these cases, is our duty. For illegals, though, expulsion is needed.
My father died when I was two years old. But my mother was quite capable. She raised three children with his war pension which was peanuts. Yet we did not want for anything. We grew up with a certain parsimony, which is a nice thing. Then if life gives you more good, otherwise you get used to. I'm still thrifty.
All the intelligence services of America and Europe know full well that the disastrous attack ( of 9/11 ) has been planned and realized from the Mossad.. with the aid of the Zionist world in order to put under accusation the Arabic countries and in order to induce the Western Powers to take part in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Fascism was part of the absolute evil. (...) We have to denounce the ashaming pages in the history of our past. (...) There included all the pages related to the discrimination and the persecution of jews and, more in general, of minoritires. And therefore that one [The Italian Social Republic of Salò] is also included.
Every Age has its own peculiar faith. Any attempt to translate into facts the mission of one Age with the machinery of another, can only end in an indefinite series of abortive efforts. Defeated by the utter want of proportion between the means and the end, such attempts might produce martyrs, but never lead to victory.
The mother's first kiss teaches the child love; the first holy kiss of the woman he loves teaches man hope and faith in life; and love and faith create a desire for perfection and the power of reaching towards it step by step; create the future, in short, of which the living symbol is the child, link between us and the generations to come.
The Family is the Country of the heart. There is an angel in the Family who, by the mysterious influence of grace, of sweetness, and of love, renders the fulfillment of duties less wearisome, sorrows less bitter. The only pure joys unmixed with sadness which it is given to man to taste upon earth are, thanks to this angel, the joys of the Family.
Tradition is the transmitting of linguistic messages that constitute the horizon within which Dasein is thrown as a historically determined project: and tradition derives its importance from the fact that Being, as a horizon of disclosure in which things appear, can arise only as a trace of past words or as an announcement that has been handed down to us.
Resistants were on the right side, Salò Republic's combatants on the wrong one. One cannot equate who was fighting for a right cause of equality and freedom, and who, apart of goodfaith, was on the wrong side. The judgement of the Right [on Fascism] have to be negative, due to freedom limitation. We cannot deny ourselves history, and Fascism was a dictatorship that denied some fundamental freedoms.