Remembering Father Giuseppe Zoppetti: “A great builder of relationships”

After one year to study English in Sunningdale, England, he arrived to Sudan. The first twenty years of his mission in Sudan, he worked as a teacher: in Comboni College Khartoum, Comboni School El Obeid, Comboni Atbara, Comboni Port Sudan and again Comboni El Obeid. He is mainly remembered as a teacher of Mathematics and Accounting, which back then were core subjects in all Comboni schools, as they were professional schools for accountants. While in El Obeid, he helped Fr. David Ferraboschi print a song book that would help the liturgical life of the diocese. In those same years, he would also help in the pastoral life of Babanusa.

In 1978 he was appointed parish priest of El Nahoud. From 1982 to 1983 he was made parish priest of the Cathedral of El Obeid, before being elected Provincial Superior. During his two mandates in this office (1984–1989), he is remembered for having moved the provincial house from CCK to Bahri. Br. Paulo Aragao was the one who assisted him in setting up the new provincial house, and worked with him for many years. In 1987 he was instrumental in the opening of the Salesian presence in Khartoum, with the handing over of St. Joseph technical school.

After his time as Provincial Superior, he was parish priest of Masalma from 1990 to 1996. The memories of many priests – and indeed among them also HG Michael Didi, Archbishop of Khartoum – go back to those years, when he mentored several vocations to the priesthood.

After Masalma, he spent ten years in Medani, as local superior of the community and assistant parish priest. According to the witness of Sr. Silvana Guglielmi, he was keen on promoting catechesis and formation of Christian families, by taking care of irregular unions and preparing couples to the sacrament of marriage.

In 2008 he was in Italy for treatment for some few months, but was able to come back to Sudan to spend some more years in Kosti, where he helped in the pastoral life of the parish until 2014, when at the age of 84 he retired and moved to Italy. To date, lay people in Kosti remember how he had at heart to visit families. Also, his love for his garden is remembered by all. HL Daniel Adwok recalls the generosity of Fr. Zoppetti; while visiting centres, he would give to children gifts and some sugar canes from his own garden.

While accompanying him to Italy in his last travel, Fr. Norberto Stonfer witnessed the great love his family had for him, as a large delegation of nephews and relatives came to welcome him at the airport. The love and affection he had in his family at home is one and the same with the care and sympathy he shared with all as a missionary.

After a couple of years in Verona Casa Madre, he was moved to the house for the elderly in Castel D’Azzano, where the Lord called back his servant to himself on Sunday 3 April 2022, at the age of 91.

Fr. Giuseppe Zoppetti is remembered by all for his simplicity and jovial character. Beside being a man of technical skills, he had a mind for Maths. His room was not orderly at all, but rather a store of tools for his many works and talents. As a parish priest, he was a man who would trust catechists and promote seminarians; he would have both of them with him at table to share meals and time. We may not remember him for buildings of bricks and iron, but he was a great builder of relationships, leaving behind happy memories of a good heart both among confreres and the people he ministered.
Diego Dalle Carbonare, MCCJ