The Fire Within Award – Women and men who change the world, was established by the Archdiocese of Milan and by Elikya, a social promotion association that has been operating in various areas of the civil and religious world since 2012.
The winners of this third edition are: Fr. Claudio Burgio, founder and president of the Kayrós Association as well as chaplain of the Beccaria juvenile prison in Milan; Carlo Alberto Caiani and his wife Sara Pedroni, who with their three children have been welcoming foster minors at the Somaschi Fathers’ farmhouse in Vercurago (LC) for almost twenty years; Blessing Okoedion, a Nigerian woman who survived trafficking and denounced her tormentors and is now engaged as a cultural mediator and interpreter; Sr. Nabila Saleh who lived for thirteen years in Gaza and who, due to the war with Israel, took refuge in the Latin Rite parish for six months, taking care of the most vulnerable who were victims of the bombings; finally Franco Vaccari, president and founder of “Rondine Citadel of Peace”, an organization committed to overcoming armed conflicts in the world.
A memorial award was then dedicated to Sr. Luisa Dell’Orto, killed in 2022 in the capital of Haiti where she was the backbone of “Casa Carlo”, a center that gathers hundreds of street children. It was rebuilt in 2010 after the earthquake that devastated the Caribbean island.
The meaning of the Fire Within Award – Women and men who change the world is to recognize those who, with their generous commitment to the good of the individual and society, have become witnesses of hope, illuminating the path of those they have met.