In Pace Christi

“The nice man with a smile who made a good impression and enthusiastically encouraged all who approached him. Despite his seventy-four years he never lost his passion for the mission”. These were the opening words of Fr. José Luis Rodríguez López, provincial of Mozambique as he gave his testimony regarding Fr. Emilio Franzolin.
Emilio was born at San Siro di Bagnoli di Sopra in the province of Padua. He frequented primary school at the diocesan college of Thiene and then went to the diocesan seminary of Padua where he finished the second year of High School. It was in those years that he began to feel attracted by the missionary vocation. He continued his studies at Chioggia seminary where he was ordained priest in 1963. In the meantime, he had already taken steps to enter the Comboni Institute and he was able to enter the Florence novitiate immediately after ordination and take his first vows in 1965.

Fr. Emilio spent his entire missionary life working in Portugal (three periods for a total of seventeen years) and Mozambique (two periods for a total of twenty-nine years). During his first “Mozambican” period he shared in the historic and dramatic events of the people with the hopes and disappointments which characterised the life of that nation. Immediately upon taking his first vows, Emilio was sent to Portugal, first as formator at the seminary of Famalicão and later worked in vocations promotion and mission promotion at Maia.

In 1969, he was assigned to the province of Mozambique (to the communities and parishes of Boroma, Mutarara, Gambula, Maputo, Sena and Chemba) working mostly in pastoral ministry. He remained there until 1974. Those were years, in Mozambique, full of great changes and developments on the political, ecclesial and pastoral levels: “The Second Vatican Council is bringing winds of renewal in the Church and finds in the Bishop of Nampula, Mgr. Vieira Pinto, a courageous protagonist, supported by the Comboni Missionaries there. The Catechetical Centre of Anchilo originated in those times… To the ideal of ‘Christianity’ is added a new vision of Church and mission in which evangelisation includes and sustains the rights and dignity of the person and of the peoples” (Mondo Comboniano, G. Franzelli, 2004). In 1975, the nation became independent only for civil war to break out soon afterwards and turn the nation into a bloody battlefield. From 1974 to 1981, Fr. Emilio was again assigned to Portugal, working at Maia and Famalicão. He then returned to Mozambique where he stayed until his death, except for a year spent in Rome doing the renewal course and six years at Maia in the Postulancy. On 26 October, 2011, he was returning from Charre where he had attended the funeral of Fr. Bruno Boschetti, the Xaverian parish priest. Fr. Emilio knew Fr. Bruno well and had helped him with the various parish activities, especially by accompanying the youth in their vocational discernment and so, despite being very tired from the work of the previous days, he went to Charre for the funeral. He began the return journey as soon as the funeral was over. On the way, his companion noticed he was driving erratically, though he was always very careful. He asked Fr. Emilio to stop but it was already too late. Fr. Emilio slumped over the steering wheel: he was already dead.
Da Mccj Bulletin n. 251 suppl. In Memoriam, aprile 2012, pp. 19-24.