A joyful celebration: 50 years of faithful service as priests and missionaries

The Immaculate Church, at the University of San Diego campus, Alcala Park, witnessed both ceremonies: the ordination and the joyous anniversary. Absent from the celebration was Bishop Caesar Mazzolari, ordained on the same day and in the same place. He passed away in South Sudan on July 16^th, as he was celebrating the Eucharist, only a week after the country he had served for many years attained its independence.

The Comboni Missionaries came to the United States in 1938, but it was in the late 40s when they went to California to take care of some Indian missions, founded many years earlier, in the diocese of San Diego. With the idea of recruiting candidates to the priesthood and missionary life, a seminary was opened in 1961 on the campus of the University of San Diego. Fr. Bragotti, Fr. Premarini and Fr. Mazzolari were in their last year of theology when they arrived in California. Shortly after ordination they left for their first assignments as Comboni priests and missionaries. Other young people, US seminarians as well as students from Italy and Mexico, would be trained at the University and at the diocesan seminary, at the time part of the campus. This Comboni enterprise came to an end in 1976 when an international scholasticate was opened in Chicago. The Comboni seminary on the West Coast remained in the memories of those who made of Alcala Park a significant period in their formation toward the priesthood.

On Sunday, March 18^th, Fr. Bragotti and Fr. Premarini, celebrated their 50^th anniversary of ordination at Sacred Heart Parish of Covina, surrounded this time by friends who live in the area and who couldn’t make the trip to San Diego. A reception in the Parish Hall followed. Fr. Premarini was accompanied, during these anniversaries, by two dear friends who came from Italy.