The Pasquale Foresi Library is adjacent to the lecture halls and is accessible from a separate entrance. Here, you will find the reading room, equipped with fifty-four tables for study and research, and the media library, with eighteen study tables, a journal collection, and eight computers with access to servers, internet services and the printer. You will find the library staff in the reference area.
The staff is composed of the Director, Prof. Sergio Rondinara and the librarian Laura Signore. he reference service is available every day for Sophia students and residents of the surrounding area.
The open-shelf library was inaugurated on 1st December 2008, and its collection has grown over the years through acquisitions and donations. It currently comprises approximately 20,000 volumes, the majority of which are catalogued and available for consultation on the Italian National Libraries Service (SBN).
Since its early days, the library has developed its very own book classification and arrangement system in order to reflect the Institute’s characteristic nature, experience and approach to knowledge.
The collection includes the following subjects:
General works
Sacred Scripture
Fathers of the Church and Tradition
Spirituality and Mysticism
Theology
Religion and Religions
History
Philosophy
Scientific Rationality
Science of the Person
Sciences of Social Living
Economics
Politics
Art and Literature
The Library is open Monday – Wednesday: 9:00am-1:30pm and 2:30pm-6:30pm
and Thursday – Friday: 9:00am-1:30pm
Tel. +39 055 9051514
E-mail biblioteca@sophiauniversity.org
Free entry
Consult the Library Catalogue
Pasquale Foresi (1929-2015) was the first co-president of the Focolare Movement – Work of Mary. With his rich personality, he accompanied foundress Chiara Lubich and played a fundamental role in enabling the charism of unity to fully express itself. The remarkable and in many ways paradigmatic unity between Chiara Lubich and Pasquale Foresi allowed some essential aspects of the doctrine and culture of the budding Movement to emerge and take shape, including the Movement’s regulations, educational structures and publishing activity.
“A life rooted in wisdom” – those were the words used by Giuseppe Maria Zanghì to describe Pasquale Foresi’s existence, which laid the foundations for both the Abba School and the Sophia University Institute.