In Pace Christi

Father António Martins was born in Portugal at Canas de Sabugosa (today, Canas de Santa Maria) on May 16, 1941. He met the Comboni Missionaries through Fr. Angelo la Salandra, who had been Parish Priest of Canas de Santa Maria for some years. He entered the Comboni Seminary of Viseu in 1954 and for ten years we were companions in the various stages of formation: five years in Viseu, two years in the Novitiate of Famalicão (which concluded with temporary vows on 9 September 1961), and three years of philosophy in Maia. For the theology courses, he was assigned to the Scholasticate of Venegono while I instead was sent to that of Rome. We both made our perpetual profession on September 9, 1967.

We were ordained priests in Viseu, together with five other Comboni missionaries, on 13 July 1968, by the then bishop of the diocese, Msgr. José Pedro da Silva. While I had the grace of being able to leave immediately for the missions of Mozambique, Fr. Martins was asked to stay in Lisbon in the important commitment of spreading our monthly magazine Audácia.

In 1970 he was sent to Mozambique to teach Portuguese and history at the School of Arts and Crafts in Carapira (Nampula). A few months later, however, the National Military Chaplaincy requested the service of a Combonian priest as a military chaplain, and the lot fell on Father António. After the course at the Military Academy in Lisbon, he left for Angola, where he arrived in November 1971 and was assigned to Uige, in the north of the country.

Fr. Martins returned to Portugal in February 1974 and was assigned to the community of Famalicão, with the task of coordinator of missionary animation. I met him there in 1976 when I was assigned to the Portuguese province and replaced him as superior of the community. From Famalicão, Fr. Martins moved to the community of Maia, where he remained until 1980, again in charge of missionary animation. Everyone knew his surprising ability to empathise with people and to weave true and profound human relationships, which promptly brought a large number of friends and benefactors to the community.

In 1980, the opportunity finally arrived for him to leave for the mission. He was sent to Peru, appointed to the parish of Cerro de Pasco, at an altitude of 4,330 metres, where he remained for four years. It was not an easy mission: the cold and lack of oxygen in the air caused tiredness and headaches, forcing the missionaries to periodically return to Lima to recover their strength. In 1984 he returned to Portugal to resume the work of missionary animation first in the community of Famalicão, then in that of Maia, where he also assumed the service of vocations promotion.

From July 1989 to June 1990, he had the opportunity to have a Sabbatical Year in Rome, at the Community of the Curia. By July, he was already in Brazil, at the parish of Ouro Preto do Oeste, Rondonia. In 1993, he was assigned to the parish of São José do Rio Preto and, in 1997, to a parish in Rio de Janeiro. In July 1999, he returned to Portugal and to the community of Maia where he remained until 2007. In July 2007, he returned to Peru for a second period of work until 2013, doing ministry in the parish of El Carmen-Chincha; in 2011, he was also appointed superior of the local Comboni community.

Returning to Portugal, he worked as an animator of vocational pastoral care in Famalicão and then a member of the community of the Postulandado Unificado and Centro Vocacional Juvenil of Maia until July 2020, when he was assigned to the community of Viseu, a house adapted to welcome the elderly and the sick. There he continued his ministry of Reconciliation and Consolation to the confreres and the people of the neighbourhood.

It was in Viseu that Sister Death called on him. On the evening of 3 February, he retired to his room, but the next morning he was found dead, probably of a heart attack. There were dozens of confreres from all our communities and some diocesan priests from nearby parishes at his funeral Mass celebrated on February 7.
Fr. Manuel Horta, mccj