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Giuseppe Antonio Tovini was born on March 14, 1841, in Cividate Camuno, Brescia, Lombardy, Italy, first of seven children of Mosè (Moses) Tovini and Rosa Malaguzzi.
After finishing six years of high school in Bergamo in 1858, Giuseppe earned a law degree from the University of Pavia in August of 1865. Two years later, he moved to Brescia and became a professional lawyer in 1868.
From 1871 to 1874, Giuseppe served as the mayor of Cividate Camuno, the Brescia community where he was born. Giuseppe encouraged the founding of banks for the people and building railroad lines.
On January 6, 1875, Giuseppe married Emilia Corbalani in the Church of Saint Agatha, and together, they had ten children. Two of the daughters became religious sisters, and one son became a Jesuit priest.
In his adult life, Giuseppe blended his religious with his activist civic life in remarkable ways. He was not only a good member of his parish, but he was also a member of the Secular Franciscans.
Outside of his parish, he was noted for serving the poor and working people by founding newspapers, banks, and schools. For example, Giuseppe founded, or helped to found, a Catholic newspaper Il Cittadino di Brescia (The City of Brescia) in 1878, a journal called Faith and School in 1891, a weekly journal called La Voce del Popolo (The Voice of the People) in 1893, and a magazine called Modern Italian School in1893. In addition, he helped found the Banco Ambrosiano in Milan and the Banca Santa Paolo in Brescia in 1888.
Giuseppe was also a strong advocate of education, especially Catholic education. For example, in addition to establishing an insurance company to serve Catholic teachers, he founded the Saint Joesph Kindergarten and the College of Venerable Alessandro Luzzago in 1882. The latter institution was dedicated to Venerable Alessandro, a man of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries who sought to harmonize the relationships between civil governments with the Church to serve the people. In addition, Giuseppe helped the Canossian Sisters found a teaching college, supported the Catholic University Federation, supported the creation of Catholic universities throughout Italy, and founded the Union Leone XIII to support the faith needs of the university students in Brescia.
Giuseppe died on January 16, 1897, and was beatified on September 20, 1998. Blessed Giuseppe Antonio Tovini’s feast day is January 16. Blessed Giuseppe’s nephew and godson, Mosè Tovini, is also a Blessed.
