None of this was planned. Needs were evident, and the Cometa philosophy is to say yes after yes. The C.E.O., Alessandro Mele, left his life as a tax consultant and now lives on campus amid hundreds of children. The man who runs the cafe, Marcello, left his old life and now mentors disabled apprentices. “I’m the 100 percent real Marcello here. I’m talking about my life, not my job,” he said.

If you or I had hundreds of kids running around there’d be general chaos. But Cometa is beautiful. The gardens are immaculate and meticulously designed. The family homes are modest but look like they came out of Architectural Digest. Every piece of furniture in the high school is colorful, elegant and unusual.

“Beauty educates,” said Serena, quoting Giussani. The children who come here often feel tossed aside. One used to be awakened by her mother with the words, “Get up, you piece of [expletive]. Breakfast is ready, you piece of [expletive].” But beautiful surroundings make the children who come here feel important, welcomed and cherished. If a toy breaks at Cometa, it is fixed right away. Likewise, every child is recoverable.

The people in Cometa don’t only treasure beauty, they assume it. In a world of distrust and betrayal, they assume there is beauty in each person and in every situation, so they lead with an almost unnerving level of hospitality.

The vocational high school curriculum is built around the idea that machines will soon be doing most physical tasks, but no machine will be able to create the feeling of a loving home. Whether they are being trained as waiters, carpenters, fabric designers or pastry chefs, students are taught to understand and create hospitable experiences. “Everything is a home,” said Mele. “Everything says, ‘Welcome to my home.’”

The idea is to give students the power to welcome others, born out of a sense that they have been welcomed. One of Giussani’s mottos resonates through Cometa: “Reality will not let you down.” You can take the radical leap, because life ultimately is beautiful.