Fr Alessandro Giacomelli, missionary among the Santal, dies
Dhaka (AsiaNews) – For Fr Francesco Rapacioli, PIME regional superior for Bangladesh, and Fr Enzo Corba, a fellow missionary, Fr Sandro Giacomelli, 68, was a missionary still on “a quest” who “loved mankind,” an example of “total embodiment” with the tribal people to which he dedicated his entire life. Father Giacomelli died yesterday in a car accident in Konabari, an industrial area north of Dhaka, on his way to visit some Tribals who were employed there. He was traveling on a motorbike when he was hit by truck and killed instantly.
Originally from Isolaccia, diocese of Como, Father Giacomelli spent more than 40 years in north-western Bangladesh, especially among tribal Santals. For the past year he was involved in helping tribal workers who had emigrated to the capital.
Father Giacomelli joined the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) in 1957. On March 14, 1964 he was ordained to the presbytery. In September of the same year he joined the mission in Dinajpur diocese in what was then still called East Pakistan, Bangladesh since 1971. From 1965 to 1968 he worked in a parish in Dhanjuri diocese. Here, together with Father Calanchi and encouraged by Father Corba who was then in charge of the community, he learnt Bangla.
“That was a great break with the times,” said Father Rapacioli, who has been in Bangladesh for ten years. “Until then missionaries in tribal areas learn the local language and did not pay much attention to the national language.” Father Giacomelli was a bit of trail-blazer, a “pioneer.”
In order to learn the language he moved to Barishal in the south of the country. He was in Andharkata in 1976, then again in Dhanjuri, among tribal people.
But in 1986 he began the mission he “felt most deeply,” according to his fellow missionaries. Until the year 2000 he lived, worked and suffered amongst his Santal; 600 in the village, more than 4,000 in the area, and two million in Bangladesh.
Father Giacomelli “loved this people for their simplicity and their culture. He believed that education, thrift and work that was respectful of nature were the pillars of his people’s development,” said Father Corba.
“In Kodbir, Dinajpur diocese, he ran a Christian ashram (a place of retreat), set up credit co-ops, worked the land and was a teacher, all successfully.”
Part of his inheritance has in fact been set aside to pay for the studies of five kids.
“When they asked him where he came from, he would say: ‘From Kodbir; I am a Santal.’ For us who arrived as young adults he was an edifying example of love for mankind, for the mission. In a certain sense we can say that with Father Giacomelli’s death a whole chapter is closing, that of the generation totally committed to evangelisation among Tribals.”
Father Giacomelli’s funeral will be held tomorrow in Dinajpur Cathedral. He will be buried in Kodbir, where he had told many people he wanted to be laid to rest.
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12/04/2007
