VATICAN CITY, 30 JAN 2009 (VIS) - A conference was held this morning in the Holy See Press Office, to present the initiatives planned to celebrate the 80th anniversary of the signing of the Lateran Pacts (11 February 1929) and the foundation of Vatican City State.
Participating in today's press conference were Cardinal Giovanni Lajolo and Bishop Renato Boccardo, respectively president and secretary general of the Governorate of Vatican City State; Barbara Jatta, director of the office for engravings and designs of the Vatican Museums, and Giancarlo Cremonesi, president of Rome's municipal energy and environment firm, ACEA S.p.A, which is the chief patron of the celebrations.
In his remarks Cardinal Lajolo indicated that three initiatives have been planned "for the occasion of the eightieth anniversary of the foundation of this small but not insignificant State".
The first initiative is an exhibition to be held in the Charlemagne Wing - at the end of the left colonnade of St. Peter's Square - from 11 February to 10 May, entitled: "1929-2009: Eighty Years of Vatican City State".
The cardinal went on to explain how the exhibition is divided into five sections. "The first concerns the Vatican prior to 1929; the second is dedicated to Pius XI (Achille Ratti), the architect of conciliation and the great builder of the juridical and architectural structures of the new State; the third focuses on the Lateran Pacts themselves, in other words the Treaty and the Concordat signed in the Lateran Palace on 11 February 1929; the fourth illustrates the construction of the State, its projects and its new buildings; and the fifth is dedicated to the six pontiffs who succeeded Pius XI, each of whom left his own mark".
Cardinal Lajolo then turned to the second of the three initiatives, announcing that an academic congress has been organised to take place from 12 to 14 February on the theme: "A small territory for a great mission". The congress will be held at two separate sites: the Conciliation Hall of the Lateran Palace, where the Pacts themselves were signed in 1929, and the New Synod Hall in the Vatican.
The work of the congress will be opened by Cardinal Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone S.D.B., and close with a roundtable meeting to be attended by, among others: Franco Frattini, Italian foreign minister; Abdou Diouf, former president of Senegal, and Michel Camdessus, former president of the International Monetary Fund.
The third initiative, concluded the president of the Governorate of Vatican City State, is a concert to be held in the Vatican's Paul VI Hall at 5 p.m. on Thursday 12 February, in the presence of the Holy Father. Our Lady's Choral Society of Dublin Cathedral and the RTE Concert Orchestra of Dublin will play Handel's "Messiah".
OP/VATICAN EIGHTIETH ANNIVERSARY/LAJOLO VIS 20090130 (470)
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