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Luigi Tezza was born on November 1, 1841 in Conegliano, Treviso, Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia (Italy) as an only child. At the age of nine, his father died, and Luigi and his mother moved to Verona.
When he was fifteen, Luigi entered the Camillian order, officially known as the Ministers of the Sick. The Camillian Fathers and Brothers vow to serve the sick even if by doing so, their lives are danger. He was ordained a priest on May 21, 1864.
As a young priest, Fr. Luigi asked if he could be a missionary in an African nation, but his superiors denied his request. Rather, he was sent to France where he spent the next three decades working to establish Camillian facilities for the sick. He also formed a province of his order in France.
In 1880, however, the French government expelled Fr. Luigi because he was a foreigner and a priest. After his expulsion, he returned to France disguised and continued his work with the sick.
In 1889, the Camillians chose Fr. Luigi as Vicar General and Procurator General of the Order. While in Rome, he also helped Blessed Giuseppina Vannini found a female branch of the Camillians, the Daughters of St. Camillus. That order expanded rapidly and formally approved by the pope in 1931.
In 1900, the Camillian Fathers had a crisis that needed attention in Peru. So, along with Fr. Angelo Ferroni, Fr. Luigi went to Peru to solve the problem. After that was solved, however, the archbishop of Lima asked Fr. Luigi to stay for a while longer. Fr. Luigi obliged, and as it turned out, he remained in Lima for the rest of his life.
While in Lima, Fr. Luigi Tezza lived the charism of his order to the best of his ability, caring for the sick and poor in the hospitals, homes, and prisons. Fr. Luigi, in addition to nursing the sick, also volunteered his time serving as a confessor and spiritual director to different religious congregations in the area.
Fr. Luigi Tezza’s service was so great in the city of Lima, that he became known as the “Apostle of Lima,” and Cardinal Lorenzo Lauri called him “the holiest priest in the Diocese of Lima.”
Fr. Luigi died on September 26, 1923 in Lima. Pope John Paul II beatified Luigi on November 4, 2001. Blessed Luigi Tezza’s feast day is September 26. He is a patron of the Daughters of St. Camillus, the order he co-founded.
