Born in Piario (Bergamo) on December 3, 1801.
Died in Bergamo on 4 June 1879.
Priest since 18 September 1824, canon penitentiary of the cathedral, after having been a teacher of moral theology in the seminary for many years, he was elected bishop of Bergamo on 19 December 1853. A faithful interpreter of the "Bergamo tradition", he was an energetic defender of respect for ecclesiastical prescriptions .
In his informal conversations with the confreres, Don Guanella referred to the example of Monsignor Speranza for his recourse to adult vocations and rapid formation, the so-called "school of fire". He recounted on March 14, 1914: «Monsignor Speranza of Bergamo heard from a certain Pifferi, a good man, the complaint of the lack of priests: he sent him to the seminary and made him a priest after a few months. Thus the so-called were born in Bergamo fife priests». Furthermore, for Don Guanella, Monsignor Speranza was the paradigm of the bishop willing to personally pay for his unconditional fidelity to the pontifical magisterium.
Sources
- Hierarchia catholica medii et modernioris aevi, vol. VIII: 1846-1903, edited by Remigium Ritzler and Pirminum Sefrin, Padua, Editrice «Il Messaggero di S. Antonio», 1878, p. 147.
- [Enrico Massara], Mons. Pier Luigi Speranza bishop of Bergamo from 1854 to 1879. Memories and documents, Brescia, 1915.
- Roberto Amadei Conquering Society: 1878-1914in Diocese of Bergamo, edited by Adriano Caprioli - Antonio Rimoldi - Luciano Vaccaro, Brescia, Editrice La Scuola, 1988, pp. 240-249.
Guanellian sources
Leonardo Mazzucchi, Fragments of the life and sayings of the sac. Aloysius Guanella [1912-1915], manuscript, in Guanellian Archive, Como, VII a 2, ff. 24, 26-27.
Image
Diocese of Bergamo, cit., fig. 38.
AM Dieguez
Guanellian Encyclopaedia
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