In Pace Christi

Febo Gabriele Chiodi was born at Gavardo in the province of Brescia (Italy) on 6 March 1914, the son of Giovanni Chiodi and Antonia Martini. His mother was a fervent Catholic while his father was an atheist, though he never opposed the Christian devotion of his wife.

In1928, Gabriele entered the Comboni seminary at Brescia where he did middle and high school studies. After his novitiate at Venegono (1933-1935) and his temporary vows, he studied philosophy at Verona and theology at the Pontifical Urbanian Athenaeum of Propaganda Fide, Rome, where he was ordained priest on 23 March 1940 in the basilica of St. John Lateran. He celebrated his first Mass at Gavardo and that same day received a special grace from God: his father, converted to Catholicism, received his first Holy Communion from the hands of his newly ordained son. It was an emotional moment for both of them.

The Institute was in a phase of expansion in those years and it fell to the lot of Fr. Gabriele to be appointed to newly founded or reopened communities. From 1941 to 1947 Fr. Gabriele worked in Italy. His first appointment was to Villa Pisa, Florence, which had been opened as a novitiate. He was then sent to Carraia, Lucca Province, with Fr. Egidio Ramponi, to reopen the minor seminary for middle school boys. In July 1943, Fr. Gabriele was sent as superior to Bologna and the recently purchased house. It was wartime and there were some really unpleasant moments such as close encounters with the Germans, bombings, the explosion of the ammunitions magazine not far from the house and the scarcity of food. Fr. Gabriele built an underground bomb shelter where a good number of people managed to find refuge.

In 1947 the superiors sent him to the USA where the Comboni Missionaries had only recently arrived. In Cincinnati, Fr. Gabriele was spiritual director of the scholasticate. Two years later he was appointed novice master of the first Comboni novitiate in the state of Indiana, only to be transferred to Forestville and finally to the new house at Monroe, Michigan (1952). After eleven years of hard work as novice master, he was sent to open a house for Brothers at Yorkville, Illinois. He had only just begun to get the house ready when he was sent to the new and still incomplete house of San Diego, California, which had become the home of the Cincinnati scholasticate. He was appointed superior and remained there for seven years (1961-1968).

In 1968 Fr. Gabriele was sent to Saint Jean de Quebec in Canada, but about eight months later he was assigned to Mexico where he carried out his missionary work until 2003, that is, as long as his health allowed him.

Fr. Gabriele arrived in Mexico in 1969, at Guerrero Negro, in Baja California, where he worked until 1973 as parish priest and local superior. Most of the men there worked in the salt fields.

During the school year he introduced the Cursillo de Cristiandad in which men and women willingly participated. The unavoidable contrasts inherent in every good work began to emerge. The Jehovah’s Witnesses began to oppose him and wanted to send him away because many of their followers were participating in the courses. They complained to the government, accusing Fr. Gabriele of God alone knows what. The bishop Mgr. Juan Jesus Posados Ocampo, informed him of a government warrant regarding him and helped him to escape to the seminary of Tijuana, a city of Baja California bordering on the United States. Meanwhile, the government had revoked the warrant and even invited him to return, since they had been informed of Fr. Gabriel’s humanitarian work to help the people, especially the poorest and the neediest of the parish. For example, he had built fifty small houses in wood for those left homeless because of a hurricane. He had also built a church and about half of the local school.

Mgr. Giovanni Giordani invited him to work at La Paz (1973-1980) and Fr. Gabriele was appointed Vicar general of the diocese. The local priests were somewhat suspicious of him at first but, having seen his commitment both material and spiritual, willingly accepted him.

When La Paz and the surrounding area was struck by hurricane Lisa, causing death an destruction among the population, the poor, as always, were the worst affected, with many rendered homeless. Fr. Gabriele, with the help of friends and benefactors in the USA, again built about fifty small houses in wood and a church dedicated to Divine Providence. Ten years later, the cathedral of La Paz, of which he was parish priest, was entrusted to the local clergy.

Eight years passed and Fr. Gabriele was sent as parish priest to Ciudad Insurgentes, always in Baja California. There he really felt he was a missionary and continued, with the help of friends and benefactors in the USA, to help the poorest and the neediest.

In 1990 he celebrated his Golden Jubilee of priesthood. The superiors transferred him to Mexico City and the parish of the Uganda Martyrs, at Colonia Moctezuma, in the Federal District. He had worked hard during his seventy five years-long life and now he felt rather tired, but he presented himself to the superior of the time, Fr. Giuseppe Gasparotto. When Fr. Gasparotto died, Fr. Gabriele was appointed superior of the community and continued to work in great simplicity with the local clergy. In the year 2000, he celebrated sixty years of priesthood.

His advanced years and somewhat uncertain health obliged Fr. Gabriele to leave the post of superior to Fr. Manuel Gutiérrez Juárez.

Deteriorating health required a stay in hospital where he underwent various operations. As he approached his ninetieth birthday, the superiors decided to send Fr. Gabriel to the Centre for Elderly and Sick Confreres in Milan, to be better looked after. On the Sunday he celebrated his last Mass in his parish in Mexico, the faithful, for whom Fr. Gabriele had worked for thirteen years, said their goodbyes with great sadness.
In August 2004, Fr. Gabriele joined the community at the Centre in Milan. Before he left for Italy, the provincial superior of Mexico, Fr. Gerardo Antonio Díaz Jiménez, wrote to him: “I wish to thank you on behalf of the province of Mexico and the entire missionary Church for the testimony of your life during many years and in many different places. Even if it is possible to count the years, it is not possible for us to know the amount of good which the Lord has accomplished through your hands, your words and your life”.

The Superior General, Fr. Teresino Serra, wrote on the same occasion: “My dear Fr. Gabriele, with this letter I wish somehow to be your companion on your journey. How are you? I do hope your health improves. I am always close to you and to all the elderly confreres with health problems, as I used to when I was vice provincial in Italy. I often enquire about you and hope to meet you soon. You are always a missionary and I am certain that all you are now experiencing you are doing it with the mission at heart.”

Fr. Gabriele returned to the Father’s house on 16 March 2008.
Da Mccj Bulletin n. 238 suppl. In Memoriam, aprile-luglio 2008, pp. 66-75.