For more than half a century, Father Luigi Paggi has lived a life most people will never see up close — riding battered roads, sitting in village courtyards, and patiently pushing back against traditions that have cost too many girls their childhoods.
In coastal Bangladesh, among some of the country’s most marginalized people, the Italian missionary has taken on child marriage not with slogans or speeches, but with presence, persistence, and a stubborn belief that change is possible.
Now 77, Paggi has spent decades embedded within the Munda Indigenous community near the Sundarbans mangrove forests, building schools, hosting children, and quietly teaching girls something radical in their world: that they are allowed to say no.
Where Early Marriage Was Seen as Protection
When Paggi first arrived among the Munda people in the early 2000s, he was shocked by what he found.
Girls were routinely married off between the ages of eight and twelve.
The practice wasn’t driven by cruelty, but by fear and superstition — a belief that early marriage kept girls safe and protected family honor.
Instead, it was killing them.
Complications from early pregnancies were claiming young lives, and the numbers told a painful story.
There were far fewer women than men in Munda villages, an imbalance that couldn’t be ignored.
“The idea was simple and devastating,” Paggi explained from his mission in Ishwaripur, Satkhira district, roughly 217 miles south of Dhaka.
“The sooner a girl was married, the better for everyone. That belief cost lives.”
A Missionary Who Learned to Fight Differently
Paggi arrived in Bangladesh in 1975, just three years after being ordained as a priest with the Society of St. Francis Xavier for Foreign Missions.
His early years were spent as an assistant pastor in Satkhira, but his calling soon pulled him deeper into communities pushed to the edges of society.
From 1980 through the early 2000s, he worked closely with the Rishi Hindu community — traditionally cobblers and sweepers — helping them understand their rights and dignity.
He introduced them to the ideas of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, encouraging peaceful resistance and civic awareness.
Over time, education opened doors, and a small Christian community eventually emerged within the Khulna Diocese.
By 2002, his focus shifted again — this time to the Munda.
A Motorcycle, a Message, and a War of Ideas
Paggi calls his campaign against child marriage “a kind of war,” though there were no banners or marches.
Instead, there was a motorcycle, narrow brick roads along the coast, and countless conversations under trees and tin roofs.
Village by village, he spoke to girls directly — not their fathers or elders first, but the girls themselves.
He warned them of the dangers of early marriage and early pregnancy.
More importantly, he told them they had a choice.
The phrase he repeated became his most powerful weapon: “Disobedience is life.”
It wasn’t about rebellion for its own sake. It was about survival.
Building Safe Spaces for Childhood
Alongside his advocacy, Paggi created alternatives.
He built a hostel that housed and educated 20 to 30 boys and girls at a time.
He helped establish pre-primary schools within Munda villages, ensuring children had a place to learn before marriage could interrupt their lives.
Over time, the results became visible. Girls who avoided early marriage stayed in school. Some went on to become teachers.
Others found work in private companies or development organizations.
Change didn’t come fast — but it came.
Minati Munda and the Life That Almost Wasn’t
One of the clearest examples of that change is Minati Munda, now 30.
As a child, her family planned to marry her off early, just as generations before them had done. Instead, she ran.
She found refuge in Paggi’s hostel, where she continued her education and later earned a bachelor’s degree in civil technology.
Today, she works as a teacher at a Caritas Bangladesh Trust technical institution.
“Father Luigi gave me a second life,” she said simply.
“If I had stayed, my life would have ended before it really began.”
Minati later worked alongside other girls to stop child marriages in surrounding villages, protecting others the way she had once been protected.
Though she followed an Indigenous religion, she eventually chose to be baptized by Paggi, becoming the first Christian from her area.
“He did what my parents could not do for me,” she said.
“I carry that gratitude every day.”
From an Italian Village to the Edge of the Sundarbans
Paggi’s journey began far from Bangladesh.
Born on July 26, 1948, in Sorico — a small village near the Italian-Swiss border — he entered the diocesan seminary of Como after primary school.
After six years there, he joined the Xaverian Missionaries and was ordained in 1972.
Bangladesh became his home just a few years later.
Decades of travel on uneven roads took their toll.
Paggi fell from his motorcycle more than once, and today he can no longer move as freely as he once did.
Still, he remains in Ishwaripur, quietly watching the slow evolution of the community he has served for over twenty years.
Progress That Comes in Inches, Not Leaps
Paggi is realistic about the limits of his work.
He admits that deep-rooted beliefs don’t vanish quickly, and that the Munda community still struggles with old customs.
But he believes time — and education — are doing their work.
What matters most to him is that fewer girls are dying, and more are choosing their own futures.
Thinking About the Final Journey Home
Despite spending more than half his life in Bangladesh, Paggi hasn’t forgotten where he came from.
As his health declines, his thoughts increasingly turn to home.
“My wish is simple,” he said. “To return to my country, die in my paternal house, and be buried in my native village.”
What Comes After Him
What happens next won’t be decided by one man.
The legacy Paggi leaves behind lives in classrooms, hostels, and in women like Minati — women who learned early that obedience isn’t always virtue, and that sometimes survival begins with refusal.
Long after his motorcycle stops running, that lesson may keep saving lives.
