In Pace Christi

Giacomo was born in Prata di Pordenone on 10th August 1937, to Santo and Maria Piccin, the second of three children. In the parish, he regularly attended catechism and, as an adolescent, became a regular visitor to the “school of faith” offered by Catholic Action. In this context, Giacomo’s desire to become a priest was born in his heart.
On 2nd July 1961, Giacomo was ordained a priest in Aviano by Msgr. Vittorio De Zanche. Immediately afterwards, he was assigned as curate to the parish of San Giovanni di Polcenigo, where there was a good group of young people to whom Don Giacomo dedicated much of his time, committing them to follow the dictates of the Gospel more closely and to open themselves more and more to the universal mission of the Church. He continued to repeat that the Church is missionary by nature, and so the idea of becoming a Comboni missionary was born in him.
In September 1967 he entered the Comboni novitiate in Florence. On 1st May 1969, he took his first vows. Immediately afterwards, he was assigned to Pordenone as the spiritual father at the scholasticate for brothers. He made his perpetual profession on 1st May 1971. At the end of 1972, he received the letter of assignment to the missions of Zaire.
On 3rd May, Father Giacomo was already in Isiro: he rested for two days and resumed his journey to the mission of Tadu, 300 km from the capital, where he had to devote himself to learning the local language, Lingala. Between one language lesson and another, Father Giacomo also wanted to experience pastoral life in the villages, always accompanied by a catechist who acted as interpreter. If there was a sick person to be anointed, he was the one to volunteer. If there was a group of catechumens or the students of a small school to visit, he was the first to ask to join those who were going there. Tadu was not the mission to which he was assigned, but he decided to leave his mark on it: on the back wall of the church, he painted a large crucifixion; on the side wall, a beautiful Madonna and child.
Six months later, Father Giacomo has the opportunity to go to Rungu. From Rungu, he went to Isiro, where the provincial superior, Father Ferdinando Colombo, gave him his final appointment: the mission of Pawa, just 56 km from the capital. He went there immediately. In the community, he found Father Elio Piasentier and Brother Annico Meloni. Regular visits to the 12 villages that made up the parish began immediately.
In 1982, Father Giacomo returned to Italy for a vacation. In 1983, he returned to Zaire and was assigned to the mission of Duru, among the Azande, near the border with Sudan. He remained there for only one year: adapting to life in the forest was difficult for him. After Dungu and a period at the parish of Sant’Anna in Isiro, in 1984 he asked his superiors to return to Italy. He gladly accepted being assigned to the community of Pordenone, where there was a postulancy for Brothers, with the task of also animating the parishes of the area in a missionary sense and helping in the ministry.
In 1989, he returned to Zaire, to the small diocesan seminary of Dungu, as a spiritual father. Two years later, the seminary was entrusted to the local clergy and Father Giacomo was assigned, as second formator, to the interprovincial Francophone Combonian novitiate of Isiro-Magambe, where the Novice Master Father Lorenzo Farronato. The two had known each other for a long time.
In March 1995, due to psychological and physical exhaustion, Father Giacomo was allowed to leave the novitiate and was assigned to the community of Lemba (Kinshasa), where the provincial bursar’s offices were located.
On 1st January 1996, Father Fernando Zolli was elected provincial superior and asked Father Giacomo if he was willing to be his secretary. He accepted, and in May he joined him in Isiro, where the provincial resided. The socio-political situation worsened. Even in the northwest, the rebels spread disorder and terror. The mission of Isiro was attacked and vandalised. The missionaries took refuge in the forest. They managed to communicate by radio with the regular soldiers still present in a barracks in the city and were picked up by them and transported to the airport of Isiro, where a plane was waiting to take them to Kinshasa. From there they left Zaire on a flight made available by the Spanish government.
The Italians arrived in Milan on 13th January. Father Giacomo spent a few weeks on vacation with his family. In April he was again on a plane taking him back to Africa and he reached Isiro on 5th May.
In 2005 he was assigned to Dondi mission where he stayed for five years: he engaged in the apostolate, visiting the villages, giving lessons to catechists at the pastoral centre, visiting the sick in the hospital... and, in his spare time, he painted a large crucifix and portraits of Saint Ambrose and Blessed Anuarite in the main church.
After Easter 2013, he left the DR Congo (formerly Zaire) and returned to Italy, assigned to the community of Cordenons. He immediately threw himself into the apostolate in the various parishes of the diocese but, from tests, it emerges that he has a tumour in his nose. He was immediately operated on. Then, for two and a half years, he had to "commute" between Pordenone and Verona-Negrar for repeated rounds of chemotherapy. Numerous other surgeries followed because the tumour had spread to the nasal septum. At the end of February 2020, he was assigned to the community that manages the rectory of San Tomio, in Verona. As was his habit, he spent hours in the confessional.
Father Giacomo’s health became increasingly serious, to the point that the provincial council, in June 2023, at the end of yet another hospital stay, took the decision to assign him to the community of the "Fratel Alfredo Fiorini" Centre in Castel d’Azzano.
And it was there that Father Giacomo passed away on 29th December 2024, surrounded by the affection and prayers of his confreres and the care of the medical staff. His funeral was celebrated in the chapel of the Centre on 2nd January 2025. Father Romeo Ballan, a long-time friend of Father Giacomo and former provincial of Zaire, gave the homily. “In 35 years spent in Congo – he said among other things – Father Giacomo has carried out various activities in different missions of that immense country. He also recounted them in a slim volume, entitled Testimonianza di Vita e di Missione. Although animated by missionary and Comboni passion, Giacomo has always maintained his style of a ‘good diocesan priest’. Those who know the varied geography of our missions in Congo, the many socio-political situations recorded in recent decades and personal and community events, are surprised and admired by Giacomo’s unfailing availability and readiness to go to new missions, stay there, help and leave for other destinations where his presence could be useful and, often, make a difference. The frequent trips, the difficult transfers, and the delicate insertions into community and pastoral contexts that were not always easy were certainly not painless. But Giacomo was always moderate regarding the information he offered, capable of covering tensions, emergencies, and crisis situations with the veil of charity.” After the Mass, the remains were interred in the Monumental Cemetery of Verona. (Edited by Father Franco Moretti, mccj)