In Pace Christi

Giuseppe-Zeno Picotti was born on 27 August 1926, at Badia Calavena (Verona), the eleventh of twelve children. His parents were well known and esteemed not only in Catholic circles but also in the cultural environment. His father, Giovan Battista, taught medieval and modern history at Pisa University.

After two years in High School, he had to enter the third year at Selva di Progno (Verona), as a “displaced person”, in the house in the mountains where his father sent part of the family on account of the bombings. Every month he would go to the school run by the Stigmatine Fathers to be examined in his studies. During those years, Giuseppe-Zeno and his brother Marco, two years his elder, had to attend the meetings of the fascist youth but they never failed in their duties towards Catholic Action.

The priestly or, more precisely, the missionary vocation became apparent in him from his early years and was assisted in this by the deeply Catholic upbringing he received in his family. His parents, therefore, were very pleased when, while in High School, he decided to become a priest. His father would have preferred he finished High School before entering the seminary but could not keep him at home much longer as he would soon have been called up for military service. He joined the diocesan seminary of Verona in 1944. The seminary had been moved to Bussolengo on account of the war. He finished his High School and did his first three years of theology. Being close to Verona he came to know the Comboni Missionaries and decided to follow his original vocation to the missionary priesthood.

Having joined the novitiate at Gozzano, he took his first vows on 3 May 1950. On 29 June, he was ordained priest in Verona Cathedral and, three years later, took his final vows at Gozzano on 9 September 1953, the feast of S. Peter Claver.

It was then that he received a letter from the Superior General informing him that he was being sent to the community of Rebbio di Como to study Economy and Commerce at Milan University. Como was also the philosophical scholasticate and he was asked to teach some subjects to the scholastics. As his studies progressed, the general treasurer would send him to see to legal problems in other places. This led him to accumulate experience in many fields.

On 22 February 1960, Fr. Giuseppe-Zeno graduated with a thesis entitled “The Administration of religious Institutes”, fruit of his six years in the financial department and also of the research he had done in about thirty Institutes to study their accounting methods.

In late 1960 he left for Uganda where he had been assigned and was sent to the diocese of Arua in the West Nile region. His first mission was at Maraca. In December 1961 he was appointed superior of the mission with Fr. Renzo Salvano and the young Brother Giuseppe Udeschini, both of whom had just arrived from Italy. Together they began to organise the work in a very wide area. They also opened a dispensary.

In 1963, he was appointed regional superior of the Arua zone (Uganda was not yet one province at that time). In collaboration with other confers, he produced a monthly newspaper Suru Amadri (Our Land), the first in the Lugbara language.

He was later appointed to the financial sub-committee of the precapitular commission in preparation for the 1969 General Chapter. He then returned to Italy where he again met his family after an absence of eight years. Towards the end of the General Chapter he was appointed General Treasurer. It was a time when a number of changes came about and decisions important to the Institute were made, such as the establishment of the Fund for the Sick and the Fund for International Scholasticates.

In 1981, Fr. Mario Locatelli was appointed General Treasurer and Fr. Giuseppe-Zeno could return to Uganda (1981-1990). During this second “Ugandan period”, he was placed in charge of the Ugandan refugees in Congo (then called Zaire). There were at least four refugee camps with at least 12,000 Ugandan refugees. Together with Fr. Renzo Salvano and Fr. David Baltz, he organised the pastoral work, assisted by three Comboni Sisters and three Sisters of Saint Vincent de Paul. He treasured the memory of this period with its solemn celebrations carried out in the open air, hut by hut visits, countless baptisms and a fine Catholic Action group: “The refugees would tell us we gave them back their hope!” After a few years he returned to Otumbari mission in West Nile. In 1986 he went temporarily to Ngeta, in Lira diocese, to deal with some problems in a diocesan founded religious Institute, the Sisters of Mary Mother of the Church.

At the beginning of 1990 he was called to Rome by the Superior General, Fr. Francesco Pierli, again as General Treasurer, due to urgent problems which needed to be resolved in that sector. After five years he was assigned to Egypt where he went in December 1995. He was appointed delegation superior from 1996 to 2001. The fact that he did not know the language (Arabic) made this appointment difficult for him. In 2000 he celebrated his Golden Jubilee of priesthood both in Cairo and in Rome where he went for the intercapitular assembly. On the cards he distributed he wrote: “An enthusiastic half century following Blessed Daniel Comboni.”

From 2002 to 2004 he was superior of the Cairo community Cordi Jesu and in charge of administration. In 2004 he was superior, curate and in charge of ongoing formation in the community of Cairo-Zamalek. In 2008 he went to Verona for medical treatment. He returned to Cairo for the period November 2008 to March 2009, in the hope of resuming his pastoral activities.

In March 2009, we find him again in Verona for medical treatment. He died there on 21 May 2009, the day the city celebrated the liturgical feast of S. Zeno.

Fr. Claudio Lurati, who worked for about twelve years with Fr. Giuseppe-Zeno in Egypt, wrote a testimony which in part reads: “We noted in him the “love for the Institute” which he served so well; his “youthful spirit” which enabled him to be always enthusiastic and participate with joy and closeness in the events in which he played a part; and his “suffering”, both spiritual and physical.”
Da Mccj Bulletin n. 242 suppl. In Memoriam, ottobre 2009, pp. 22-36.