In Pace Christi

Born on 14 November 1923, at Segonzano, Alfredo Mattevi was orphaned at two years of age and was reared in the affectionate care of his father, his stepmother and his aunts. He was lively and intelligent, devout and thoughtful, and showed a propensity for spiritual things even from his infancy. The curate of Gresta, a fraction of Segonzano, followed him with particular attention and encouraged him, with the added support of his aunt Eliza, to enter the diocesan seminary of Trento. That was in 1935. There were also two other boys from Segonzano in the seminary, Luigi and Livio Ruggera, with whom Alfredo always had relations of cordial collaboration and brotherly friendship.

Having finished high school, and almost certainly following the example of Luigi Ruggera, who had left the diocesan seminary to become a Comboni missionary, in the autumn of 1943, Alfredo – then a theology student – decided to enter the Institute and commenced the novitiate at Venegono, where he took first vows in 1946.

Those were difficult years, due also to the dramatic events that took place during the Second World War, with all sorts of hardships and privations, the lack of news from home, etc., which Alfredo faced and overcame with great courage and dignified determination. He completed his theological studies and was ordained priest by Cardinal Idelfonso Schuster at Milan Cathedral on 11 June, 1949.

A year later his African adventure began that lasted over fifty years: 32 years in Eritrea, 4 in Uganda and 13 in South Sudan.

In Eritrea, then part of Ethiopia, for almost thirty years – with the exception of three years ministry in Verona – he carried out his service as a teacher at Asmara. He worked well and was greatly esteemed for it. His students, boys and girls from a rich cultural background, were Europeans, Indians, Arabs and Jews and greatly appreciated his lessons in mathematics, knowing that he was a demanding teacher and was extremely exact when correcting exercises.

Fr. Alfredo was a man who was reserved and quiet, a lover of hunting and fishing, especially since these enabled him to boost the meagre provisions offered by the bursar of the community. Being “parsimonious”, he made his own cartridges for his hunting rifle. He had no pastimes or distractions; he occupied his free time recycling whatever he found useful whether copybooks left by students, pieces of paper, ballpoint pens and so on.

He also had a great spirituality: confreres and Sisters always found in him a guide who, to his personal experience, added a profound knowledge of the Comboni charism.

In 1983, he was appointed to South Sudan where he worked for seventeen years in very difficult conditions. He spent the first four years – while belonging to South Sudan – in Uganda, as a teacher at the minor seminary of Kocoa, which had been opened for Sudanese seminarians. He then spent nine years at Juba and four in Bahr el Ghazal.

There, too, he was distinguished for his teaching of mathematics – competent, patient and effective. He was an example of industriousness, of attention to detail and humble services – as the confreres testified – but also of great wisdom and encouragement in the difficulties of community life.

On 11 June, 1999, the community of Mapuordit warmly celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the ordination of Fr. Alfredo who was also able to celebrate the event in Italy among relatives and friends, first at the church of Gresta and then at the parish of Segonzano, where he received the affectionate and appreciative respects of the community.

When his strength was failing and his health became poor, he willingly agreed, in silence and without complaints, to return for good to Italy.

When he was almost eighty, Fr. Alfredo withdrew to the house of mission promotion at Lucca. In 2002 he took part in the meeting of the eight Comboni missionaries from Segonzano, as they gathered to celebrate Mass at the shrine of Our Lady of Help.

He spent seven years in Lucca and then went to Verona for some months, then to Arco for three years, always for health reasons, and lastly to Milan where Fr. Alfredo died on 26 December, 2014.

Da Mccj Bulletin n. 262 suppl. In Memoriam, gennaio 2015, pp. 117-122