Visit the Library (22.10.2011) - ISTITUTO DI STUDI ECUMENICI SAN BERNARDINO

Visit to the Library

(22-10-2011)

On Saturday morning 22nd of October 2011, a group of 25 people led by Giovanni Grazioli Director of the Civic Library of Belluno visited our library. A few days following the visit, we received this e-mail:

I would like to sincerely thank you and your colleagues for the hospitable reception towards the group of Belluno citizens I accompanied on the visit to your Convent, Library and church of San Francesco della Vigna.

We spent a very pleasant morning and all the participants wanted to express their gratitude for the competence, integrity and kindness shown during the guided tour; the refinement and beauty of the rooms visited the library distinguished by modernity and order and the documents kept within incunabula, XVI century printed books, manuscripts, ancient illuminated books, illustrated, rare and irretrievable editions.

As a librarian I am extremely pleased to see the attention paid to the preservation of documents, for all the books collected from decommissioned convents, their appreciation, and for the attention paid to specialist users, a mission of your Library. Furthermore, the intention to catalogue the National Library Service is a truly worthwhile undertaking, qualified librarians placing all the documents and bibliographic references at all on-line users' disposal and offering a consultation service. You may certainly consider your Library an institution of excellence and an example to be emulated, compared to the ecclesiastical libraries which in general are often closed and difficult to access.

Please send my warmest thanks to your collaborators who became our invaluable and pleasant guides that day, and the parish priest who, even on short notice, was able to give us a complete historical-artistic-religious overview of the church.

With no hesitation, I will recommend other librarian colleagues to encourage visits to San Francesco della Vigna, to rediscover and value such important sites of culture and religiosity which otherwise risks being little known and underutilized.

Giovanni Grazioli

Civic Library of Belluno