Mauro-Giuseppe Lepori, Abbot General of the Cistercian Order; Paola Marenco, Vice President of the Takashi and Midori Nagai Friends Committee. Moderated by Letizia Bardazzi, President of the Italian Association of Cultural Centers.

Dr. Takashi Nagai, a Japanese radiologist, converts to Christianity thanks to his encounter with his wife Midori, a fundamental figure in his life. Participating in the war twice, Nagai develops leukemia due to the X-rays performed on thousands of people. When the atomic bomb is dropped on Nagasaki, he loses his wife, and his house is completely pulverized. On the last page of his autobiography, he writes: “What had to perish had perished. What had to die had died… When I realized that I had worked my whole life for something that had turned to ashes, I was devastated. A life for ashes! I could not bear a senseless life! I had to find what does not perish. I had to cling to what never dies.” His life is the story of this Friendship, which manifests through his affection and relationship with his wife Midori and his friendship with the descendants of Nagasaki’s “hidden Christians,” leading him to discover “what never dies.” Despite being immobilized by illness in a small wooden hut, Takashi Nagai becomes an inspiring and influential figure throughout Japan.