Mario Ferrario

Mario Ferrario was born in Milan on 7 June 1936, the son of Carlo Ferrario and Maria Vistoletti, and christened into a Catholic family whose first hard lessons came from the ravages of the Second World War. He grew up in the alpine north of Italy, a country still learning how to stand again, and the mountains seemed to settle into him early. Friends and family would later remember a calm, deep voice and a steadiness others leaned on: the bearing, perhaps, of a boy who had learned young that the world could shake but the hills did not.

After trade school, he served as an alpino in the Italian military from 1957 to 1959, the mountain infantry whose discipline and love of the high country shaped him for life. He returned to civilian work as an accountant in a coffee factory in Milan, and it was there he met Luciana Villorini. Two years of courtship led to their marriage on 16 September 1963. Sara arrived in 1964, Marzia in 1967, and the young couple seemed set for a quiet Milanese family life.

In 1969 they encountered the Unification movement, and everything widened. By 1970 they had uprooted to Rome to open the work in Italy; in 1973 Mario moved north again to pioneer Bergamo. In 1974 he and Luciana founded Tonga, a company selling ginseng and natural health products, a livelihood that doubled as a way to meet people and share faith. On 22 December 1976 they renewed their vows at Belvedere, New York, among the 35 couples blessed by Rev. Sun Myung Moon. Donata was born in 1978, Bianca in 1979, and the family became its own travelling congregation.

He retired from Tonga in 1992 to minister to couples across Italy, and in 1996 accepted a missionary posting to Romania, moving there with Luciana and the two younger girls. The Romanians called him Nonno (grandfather) and meant it. One who knew him there remembered him as a 'wonderful father and spiritual father... you who loved Romania so much.' Health concerns brought him back to Italy in 2008, in time to enjoy his first grandchildren, Giulia and Matteo.

In 2017 Mario and Luciana crossed the Atlantic once more to be near their younger daughters' families, dividing their time between Chicago and the Washington area, learning the names and habits of five more grandchildren: Mimi, Henry, Jonathan, Brian, Kio, and Owen. He passed away in Buckeystown, Maryland, on 1 January 2020.

His friend Elio remembered the comedy of their first witnessing attempt in Milan's Lambro Park, two earnest young men peering over a stranger's newspaper until the man stood up, handed it to them, and walked off. Patrizia remembered his unique calm voice answering every question with love. Luciana Sampieri sent him off with the image he would have liked best: a mountaineer crossing into new summits 'made from light, freedom, love, loyalty, and wisdom.'

He is survived by Luciana, his wife of fifty-six years; by Sara, Marzia, Donata, and Bianca; and by seven grandchildren who carry his lineage forward. A life, as one pastor said simply, well lived.