Don Giuseppe Rizzo

Don Giuseppe Rizzo (22 December 1863 in Alcamo – 17 April 1912 in Alcamo) was an Italian Catholic priest, politician and journalist.

Biography Don Rizzo was early challenged in his childhood, as his father was a humble workman and his mother died when he was only three years old. He attended the Royal Gymnasium (high school) in Alcamo, and completed his philosophical and theological studies, at the diocesan seminary of Mazara del Vallo, where he was ordained as a priest, on 22 September 1888.

During the first years of his priesthood, he devoted himself to educating young people. He founded an oratory, dedicated to Saint Francis de Sales, and later the Association of Azione Cattolica "Don Bosco", to give an appropriate social, political, and religious formation to the young.

The association aimed at educating to an open and practical life as a Christian, studying and promoting the activities of Azione Cattolica, useful for the country according to the principles of Christian Democracy, willed by the Pope.

Following his election as a town councilor, he served as a mediator of peace between opposing parties; he trained people to vote freely and disinterestedly and worked for the moralisation of the town administration.

In those years, access to credit was the Sicilian farmers' greatest problem: they were obliged to appeal to a rescue, an archaic form of anticipation that owners gave to farmers, but with an annual interest up to a level of 50 per cent or, in extreme cases, to usury. This made it very difficult for most farmers to build wealth.

From the beginning, Credit Unions have had a close relationship with a territory, linking their history with that of communities, enough to win the appellation of "local bank". The Banks of Cooperative Credit have structured themselves in a national system called Credit Union.

The Banca Don Rizzo is still active and has about 3,000 partners today growing from the initial 24. The bank has opened 17 branches in several centres of the provinces of Trapani and Palermo.