Privato and Marco Roncalli, respectively nephew and grand-nephew of Pope John XXIII, participated in recent days in a Day of Tribute to the great protagonists of the twentieth century at Oviedo, in Spain. Called “Memoria de los Grandes”, and promoted by the Prince of Asturias Foundation, the event enabled the closest surviving members of the families of great personalities of the last century to meet for the first time. Apart from the family of Roncalli, the descendents of Mahatma Gandhi, Federico Garcia Lorca, Pablo Neruda, Albert Camus, Winston Churchill, Charles Chaplin, Stravinsky, Jean Monnet, Andrej Sakharov and others attended the Day of Tribute. The aim of the event was to recall the teachings of some of the personalities who shaped the history of the twentieth century. Apart from the main event, held in the large Theatre of Oviedo, various other celebrations were held. Together with Carlos Osoro Serra, Bishop of Oviedo, Marco and Privato Roncalli spoke at a seminar on “John XXIII: from his family to family of the world”. It was also an occasion to recall the visit of Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli to the Principality of Asturias in the spring of 1950 when he was Apostolic Nuncio in Paris and a further visit four years later as Patriarch of Venice, on the occasion of the Compostelan Holy Year, at the invitation of Cardinal Quiroga y Palacios. After the talk given by Marco Roncalli, who underlined the peculiarity of Roncalli’s relationship with his relatives before and after his election as Pope, the seminar in Oviedo was addressed by Privato Roncalli, who was present at the bedside of Pope John XXIII during the illness preceding his death on 3 June 1963.
