Sant'Egidio Founder Awarded as Peacemaker

(March 7, 2009) Andrea Riccardi is being awarded the International Charlemagne Prize, recognizing him as a "great European" whose life has been at the service of his neighbour. The founder of the Catholic lay Sant'Egidio Community was informed of the prize Thursday. He will receive it on May 21. The International Charlemagne Prize of Aachen is awarded for outstanding contributions to the cause of European understanding and communal endeavour, of humanity and world peace. The Judges said his life has given "an extraordinary sign and example of the European values of peace, of solidarity and human dignity and of civil commitment for a better world." Riccardi said that this award for the founder of the Sant'Egidio Community is a call to Europe to rediscover its vocation to solidarity and openness and for his passionate commitment to supporting understanding and dialogue between peoples of every religion and nationality and for the Sant'Egidio Community in giving an outstanding contribution to a more peaceful and fair world." "Europe cannot live for itself, this is what the Charlemagne Prize acknowledges," Riccardi said noting that the Community is committed in Africa and Latin America. "Sant'Egidio's Europe is pointed to solidarity; it is a Europe pointed to the outside, in an endeavour for peace and for the poor," he added. Born in Rome in 1950, Andrea Riccardi is a professor of contemporary history in Rome. He is an expert in modern and contemporary Church history. Before entering college himself, he brought together a group of pre-university students in Rome, and the Sant'Egidio Community was thus born.