God & I: Tullio Pastorelli, OFM Conv.

COULD you tell us about your religious formation as a child?

I grew up in a family steeped in religious traditions, especially charity towards the poor. I remember my father making the sign of the cross before sowing our farm in the mountains. There was also an image of St. Anthony the Abbot by the barn. My uncle, a diocesan priest, was also a key influence in my life, as he often visited our village.

What attracted you to the Franciscan life?

Its values of prayer, simplicity, fraternity, and ecology. I was drawn to the friars’ connection to rural life because of its closeness to God, and by their dedication to the poorest of the poor.

After years as a Franciscan friar, you felt called to the missionary life. What inspired you to go do mission?

I always had a desire to be a missionary. In my hometown, missionaries like friars Giovanbattista and Arcadio, as well as two nuns working in Africa, fascinated me with their stories. Giovanbattista’s tales of Mozambique in the 1970s, with extreme hunger and children scrambling for rice, left a deep impression.

What truly awakened my desire for consecration was the sudden death of friar Stefano, a fellow townsman and dear friend, at just 23. His passing prompted deep questions with me about the meaning of life. This inspired me to seek a life of purpose with spiritual depth.

After his death I frequently visited the friars at San Romedio, near my village. Here I often went for confession, and so I eventually joined the Order as a postulant. I later professed solemn vows as a Franciscan Conventual friar here at the Basilica of Saint Anthony in Padua. Later, I was also ordained a priest.

In 2007, I began my mission in Chile working first in Copiapó’s desert, and then in Curicó until 2023. My focus was youth ministry and aiding the poorest of the poor. With my fellow friars, we launched projects in agriculture, handicrafts, education, and housing for those in need. Our efforts were warmly embraced by the kind Chilean people.

During these 16 years of mission in Chile, has there been a moment that particularly impressed you?

Let me mention just one. In the Copiapó area multinational companies manage the production of table grapes. These multinationals fly expensive helicopters over the crops so that the spring dew does not freeze the tender buds that have just blossomed. In this way the crops are protected, and we in rich countries can enjoy grapes even at Christmas. In contrast, in the chapel of St. Anthony of Borgogno, belonging to the parish of St. Francis, an elderly man living in the slum fell ill. Neighbors were forced to tie him to a chair, and after much difficulty they managed to take him to the ambulance, which could not reach his ramshackle home. The situation made me think, “Here they use expensive helicopters to safeguard the grapes while the poor are abandoned!”

On April 19, 2023 you were hit by a bus while riding a bicycle. What do you remember about that terrible accident?

Actually, two years earlier, in 2021, I had been diagnosed with central nervous system lymphoma, which had been treated and cured with chemo and stem cell auto-transplantation. To recover, I began stretching in my room and walking in the park to get my brain and muscles moving again. As the doctors had advised me, I was also biking 20 km twice a week in the outskirts of Santiago. Two years ago, on April 19, a bus did not give way, and I ended up under the vehicle. One leg remained under the bus and the other was broken in three places.

Despite everything I managed to call my fellow friars. I was shouting that I was going to die. The friars arrived immediately, and so did the ambulance that took me to the nearby hospital. I remember a gentleman who took off his belt and tied my leg while  urging me not to lose hope!

We quickly went into the operating room where the surgeon said, “Unfortunately I have bad news, Tullio. We’re going to have to cut off one leg, but we’re going to try to save the knee in the other leg.

What keeps you going in this hard trial you are facing?

I was already prepared to leave this world at the time of the lymphoma, but when I also managed to pass through this second health crisis, other paths seemed to open for me. I asked the good Lord, “What do you want from me?”

When we fall into pain and misfortune, we begin to view life differently. It’s easy to say to people, “have faith,” but when you’ve been hit by misfortune personally, it can become difficult to trust.

I think of the life of St. Francis when he was ill at San Damiano. He was blind, suffering from many illnesses of his body, and he was misunderstood by some of his brethren. Despite all this he managed to compose the Canticle of the Creatures, which is also called the Canticle of the Sun. In this song he praised God with the beauty of all creation. Though I cannot compare myself to St. Francis, I too have discovered that I can love God through suffering and pain. If I truly surrender myself in faith to His will I can still glean, even in the darkest and most painful moments, something of God’s light and ineffable sweetness.

You are now confined to a wheelchair. How do you cope with daily challenges?

My new situation has enabled me to discover curious and beautiful realities. For example, I have discovered a living Church that prays so much for me. Also, the friends I made in life are now close to me, helping me overcome my everyday difficulties.

The values I admired in the Franciscan Order in my youth I now experience concretely in the love that my fellow friars have for me. There is always a friar, family member, or friend at hand to help me. For example, being bound to a wheelchair means that for me getting a book from a shelf or preparing a coffee cup is an almost impossible task.

Who is God to you?

In John’s Gospel Jesus gives these beautiful images of himself: I am the Living Bread; the Good Shepherd; the Way, the Truth and the Life.

I experience God like a shepherd who has come to look for me, a sheep in need. He is now carrying me on His shoulders because I wouldn’t be able to live without Him.

For me God is like the beautiful, unchanging sun: He enlightens us, He warms us. Just like the light and warmth of the sun is always the same, but we perceive them more weakly in winter with respect to the summer, so do we perceive God differently when we are 20 years old from when we’re 40.

Pier Giorgio Frassati will be canonized on August 3 this year. He once rightly said, “We should never just get by, we should live!” Living with faith and wisdom is not easy, but it can fill one with joy and peace.

How have the difficulties you are experiencing influenced your faith?

They have strengthened it and made it more mature, but not rigid. I see a king entering Jerusalem riding on a donkey – what a strange and different logic from ours God has!  My focus is on The Poor Crucified Christ – there I see that the thorns are a crown, the nails the scepter, and that the cross serves as a throne.

Looking at the future, how do you envision serving the Lord?

I am now slowly recovering while engaging in some pastoral counseling. After 25 years of priesthood, my accident led me to discover the immense world of physical and mental suffering.

Before the accident I would visit the sick. I talked and prayed with them and then I would leave to do other ministries. After the accident, especially during my long hospitalization, I gained firsthand knowledge of suffering. I also discovered how much hardship the family members of sick people experience, and that the sick often spend many hours in solitude.

So, I bring to my ministry a certain empathy and faith – just a little message or a phone call every now and then, or a biblical meditation read together, are enough to make all the difference to those who carry the cross of great suffering.

The world runs so fast that it manages to take even us along with it, and without realizing it we get carried away by it. Now that I am stuck in a wheelchair my priorities have changed! I have more time to think, to meditate, and to pray.

Do you have a special relationship with St. Anthony?

I have always had a devotion to Anthony, partly because he was able to speak truth to power, and because he also defended the oppressed and the sick. One need but recall the many miracles that still happen today through his intercession to become aware of his importance.

In 1997 I professed my solemn vows here at the Basilica of Saint Anthony, and in the following year I was ordained a deacon here. My first assignment as a priest also took place here.

One day I was helping the caretaker of the Basilica prepare the Saint’s statue for a procession. While he was fixing the relic I was arranging the flowers. Because the Basilica was closed, I shouted, “Saint Anthony, give me the grace to become a missionary!” And three years later the Saint answered my prayer!

World Day of the Sick is celebrated on February 11. What does this anniversary mean for you?

Sick people are often forgotten. Illness and suffering are scary realities, and people do not want to face them. Society does not consider it proper to talk about pain and death, even if it’s impossible to hide them!

However, it is important to remain close to those who are suffering, even in their moments of anger, sadness or anguish. This is hard at times, one does not know what words to use, but no matter how hard, it can be done if we remain empathic and remember the sacredness of life. One can have confidence in the sick person even if he or she sees everything as darkness. Together it is possible to see the light, even if the sick person cannot see it just yet.

Caregivers are not only necessary for the everyday necessities of sick people. They also serve to ensure that the sick do not withdraw into themselves in their pain.

Here is a paradox to meditate on: Even though I have been confined to a wheelchair for almost two years, I feel that life continues to be wonderful. It is beautiful to wake up in the morning, open the window, and see the first faint shoots of spring against the blue sky. All this beauty was created by the Lord to bring us back to Him, as St. Francis says in the Canticle: Praised be you, my Lord, for all your creatures... for the sky, the stars, the fire, the sun, the water.

Therefore, despite my trials and sufferings, for me life continues to be an adventure leading me ever deeper into God’s boundless love, and I continue to be deeply grateful to Him for having given me the wonderful gift of life.

BORN IN Coredo, Trento, on September 1, 1963, Tullio Pastorelli entered the Friary of San Francesco near Treviso as a postulant in 1988. Friar Tullio professed his solemn vows at the Basilica of Saint Anthony in Padua on October 4, 1997. He was subsequently ordained a priest at the Basilica of Saints Martyrs Sisinio, Martirio and Alessandro at Sanzeno near Trento on September 4, 1999.

In 2007 he left as a missionary for Chile, where he was guardian and rector of the Curicó Friary.

On April 19, 2023 Friar Tullio had a serious accident that forced him to return to Italy. He is currently staying at the Theological Institute St. Anthony Doctor in Padua, where he is dedicating his time to pastoral counseling and to helping the sick.