Writings

[3544]
I would like to send you at least a line with this letter that I am glad to write to the venerable Pastor of our dear Diocese of Brescia, to offer Your Most Reverend Lordship my most respectful and cordial regards, and to recommend myself to your holy prayers which are our support and consolation. I hope that my Carcereri’s visit to Brescia will be blessed by the Sacred Heart, since I hope he will not leave the glorious city of the Martyrs without the prospect of obtaining later or immediately some young priests or clerics or lay craftsman from Brescia to come and share the efforts of the African apostolate with us. I am wishing and praying for your health and prosperity, and that of our venerable Monsignor who is all love for God and whose Episcopal Jubilee will be solemnly celebrated in the Institute of Africans in Cairo and in all the Missions of Central Africa on 30th September next year. Please have a look in various parts of the Diocese to see whether there are any solid vocations for Africa.
[3545]
How pitiful is the Church’s plight in Italy, in Prussia and in Switzerland; but what consoling examples of courage are shown by the glorious Bishops, the clergy and the laity. Today’s legal France also arouses compassion. It seems to me that that Broglie (whom I knew personally and who to all appearances was most devout, but whose father reprimanded him for liberalism) is a real swindler. France is full of virtues and sins. But with God’s help I hope that her king, who has a truly regal mind and heart, will return to his place in a few years. I hope that Chambord will be blessed; but in the meantime the modern Diocletian of Berlin is raging madly. However the Angelic Pius is alive, and God comforts us. Oh! I trust in all the prayers and virtues of the Catholic world; they will be effective in undoing the work of Satan and in making the Cross triumphant.
[3546]
Receive my whole heart, and may the Heart of Jesus be the centre and bond of communication between us, between scorching Africa and the homeland of Brescia. With these sentiments I am pleased to declare myself in the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary
Yours most affectionately in Jesus Christ,


Daniel Comboni
Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa

I am very glad about the solemn celebrations of St Angela Merici in Brescia and Desenzano. How many graces!

[3547]
I have no words to express my sorrow at hearing of the death of our most eminent and venerable Father. With our most Eminent Cardinal Prefect, the Church and above all the holy Missions have lost a true pillar, a great support, a profound intelligence. On the Monday after the Octave of Easter, the Office will be sung in Khartoum and in Kordofan with the solemn Requiem Mass for the repose of His Eminence’s soul, and we shall postpone the celebration of the sorrowful memorial with the Funeral Oration until the anniversary of his death. For the rest of my life, I shall never be able to forget His Eminence Cardinal Barnabò and his charity to me.
[3548]
Having no news of his successor whom the Holy Father will not be long in appointing because the Church is always rich in extraordinary men, I address my condolences for this loss to your Most Reverend Excellency, professing my perfect and unlimited obedience in omnibus et quoad omnia, and begging you to help me in this arduous and demanding mission; since it is sustained by the Sacred Heart of Jesus, we hope we shall be able to give it sound foundations and impress upon it a stable and lasting character that will withstand all the assaults of the powers of the abyss. If His Eminence Cardinal Capalti were enjoying the best of health, he looks like the successor to me: but since I heard from the newspapers that he is dying, my gaze is directed to the most venerable Cardinal Billio and the extremely acute Cardinal Monaco La Valletta, personages and men ad hoc, whose fresh and vigorous age would enable them to develop the Apostolate of the Holy Missions in the two worlds admirably.
[3549]
Anyway, the one the Holy Father chooses will be appointed by God and will dispose of our will and our life. The many matters of serious importance that I must submit to the Holy See on behalf of the mare magnum of Central Africa will be the subject of my next epistolary communication. In the meantime, thanks to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the two main Missions in Khartoum and Kordofan are flourishing. The Sisters’ Institute is very well installed in El Obeid; the magnificent new building of the Sisters’ Institute in Khartoum is rapidly going ahead. My bursar, St Joseph, is showing great judgement in taking care in his mandate to fulfil perfectly the haec omnia adiicientur Vobis.
[3550]
I am preparing the expedition and what is required to found the mission among the Nuba immediately after the Kharif, that is, the equatorial rains; and Fr Carcereri will give you an idea of the great mission entrusted to me of which I will give you a brief report.
[3551]
The last letter with which Propaganda honoured me is dated 5th January this year, and is marked N. 2. This implies that N. 1, which I have not received, had already been sent. I therefore beg Your Most Reverend Excellency to let me have a copy of N. 1, which certainly went astray.
I dare to beg Your Excellency further to favour me with the instruction on the Titulo Ordinationis. If I remember clearly, it seems to me that it was entitled: “Instructi” S. Cong.nis de Prop.da Fide, data Romae ex Aedibus dictae S. Cong.nis 27 aprilis 1871, and it also included Missionis titulo with the formula of the oath. I have had one man ordained by Mgr Curcia, and I shall have another ordained this year, on the basis of the Rescript received in July 1872. I would like to have this instruction.
In the meantime I kiss your sacred hand, and declare myself in the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary
Your Excellency’s humble and most devoted son

Daniel Comboni
Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa

[3552]
“…In my vast Mission I have a Priest, Fr Salvatore Mauro, superior and parish priest of the Mission in Kordofan (which to date is the most interior and central of all Africa) who is extremely keen on the devotion to St Jude Thaddeus; he has succeeded in making us all enthusiastic about the devotion to the great Apostle, but especially the new Christians, and no grace is asked without also involving this Saint. Since it seems to me that he is not joking, I have decided to consecrate a statue, an altar and a church to St Jude Thaddeus, if God gives me life, in several localities among the Nuba peoples in the heart of unknown Africa, which I have just had explored. I myself shall visit them after the rains and found a new mission there, introducing the Sisters of St Joseph who, according to my judgement and experience, are the kind of true Catholic missionaries who do a world of good in my difficult and most demanding Vicariate and make themselves respected by the Pashas, admired by the Turks and loved by the Africans, by the simplicity of their manners and their education.
[3553]
If I did not have a hotchpotch of occupations I would have liked to write you something about the Apostolate of these Sisters, true images of the ancient women of the Gospel, who with the same facility with which they teach the “ABC” to the abandoned orphan in Europe, face months of long journeys in 60 degrees Réamur, cross deserts on camels and ride and control horses, sleep in the open air under a tree or in the corner of an Arab boat, threaten armed Bedouins, scold the immoral man for his vices, reduce the concubine to repentance, help soldiers in hospital, claim justice from the Turkish courts and from the Pashas for the unhappy and the oppressed, do not fear hyenas or a lion’s roaring, take on all efforts, disastrous journeys and death, to win souls for the Church and respond with their own force, with miraculous weakness and their very lives to that Heart which ignem venit mittere in terram.
[3554]
I also want to give you a detailed account of the movements in this great Mission of mine, the most vast and populous in the whole world, and I will do so when I have more time. And while I am consecrated body and soul to the Apostolate of Central Africa, I cannot hide from you my anguish of soul at seeing our adored Holy Father so tormented and the Church persecuted: and at thinking how much more remains to be suffered by the Pope, Rome and the Church. It is true that the Church will triumph totally, and that all the Institutions that persecute the Church will, like huge masses without a base, collapse and disappear from the world, destroying themselves by themselves, as will happen to Bismark, that modern Heliogabalus: but meanwhile the Pope will suffer, so there remains to us the anchor of prayer and the most safe of havens in the Sacred Heart".

(Daniel Comboni)

[3555]
We are sorrowing. Our dear Sr Giuseppina Tabraui is in heaven. This year we made 14 novenas for her in Khartoum and in Kordofan; in a year, we have celebrated more than 100 Masses for her. But God did not want to grant my prayers. May He be Blessed! On Thursday morning, 16th April, at 10.30, Sr Giuseppina breathed her last assisted by me. I administered to her all the Sacraments of the Church with the papal Blessing in articulo mortis. I recited all the prayers of the dying with her ordinary confessor, Canon Pasquale Fiore, Parish Priest and Superior of the Mission in Khartoum who assisted her night and day for two months. She has gone to heaven, I assure you, without even touching Purgatory.
[3556]
The sound of the bells announcing the death of the Mother Superior of Khartoum drew a crowd of people to the Mission who came to present their condolences to me. Sr Giuseppina was mourned by the whole city of Khartoum; she was esteemed by all and especially by the Pasha, the Governor General, the Consuls and all the Catholics. Her funeral took place on the 17th, Friday morning, at 8; I and my Missionaries celebrated the funeral rites, the Nocturne, the sung Mass presente corpore, attended by the Austrian Consul and all the Catholics. His Excellency Ismail Pasha, Governor General of the Sudan, willingly deigned to be represented by His Excellency the President of the Court of Commerce, with 4 soldiers who accompanied the body from the church to the European cemetery.
Indeed, all the Ordinaries, but especially those of the Catholic religion, shared the sorrow with which the good Lord has stricken us.

[3557]
As we were returning to the Mission from the cemetery, Sr Genoveffa came in through the garden. She had just arrived in Khartoum, after a journey of 82 days from Cairo. You can imagine the impression that the news of Sr Giuseppina’s death made upon her. However, she has regained her courage and at the moment I am glad that she has arrived in perfect health.
[3558]
You will be fully resigned, my dear Mother, to Sr Giuseppina’s death. I am not at all. It will be impossible to find another such missionary. She knew the nature of our Mission; she was prepared to sacrifice her life for the 100 million Africans who make up our Vicariate. I hope that God will comfort me and gradually take away my grief. At the moment I am deeply sad. May God be blessed.
[3559]
I have been told and people have written to me that Sr Caterina Tempestini, Superior in Rome, has been ill for 8 months, and that she is consumptive. Recently they have written that the doctor has hopes of saving her. My good Mother, consumptive dukes, princes, and princesses have all left Europe for Egypt and especially Cairo. Now in old Cairo and precisely in our Sisters’ house, there is the best climate. I have got rid of almost all those African girls educated in Europe who were an encumbrance to our house in Cairo. There is no more suitable place to spend the winter than in our house. I believe it would be good for Sr Caterina’s most valuable health to accept my offer. I will give orders that she lack nothing. The climate of Egypt, the visit to the Holy Land, the absence from her occupations will do her good. If it were not for the great desert, our magnificent garden in Khartoum would do her good.
[3560]
I will see that you receive the 500 francs I promised to pay you for every Arab Sister from your noviciate who is considered useful for the apostolate of Central Africa. I hope you will have appointed a lot of Sisters to Central Africa. I shall write to you about our affairs when the storm of Sr Giuseppina’s death has passed. All the Sisters in Khartoum and in Kordofan are well.

Pray for your

Daniel Comboni


Translated from the French.

[3561]
When I founded in Cairo an Institute for the education of Africans more than six years ago, I did not yet exercise any jurisdiction in Central Africa. Now that the Holy See has entrusted this immense Vicariate to me, I can observe with joy that the education of Africans is more successful and less expensive in El Obeid than it is in Cairo.
[3562]
In Egypt, the keep of an African boy or girl costs from 300 to 350 francs. Five out of 10 Africans educated in Cairo die or fall ill. If we take them to Europe, the majority die. Those who survive live at the expense of the houses which have been charitable enough to take them in. There are very few of the African girls there who embrace the religious life; as for the African boys, a small number settle into a nice and regular life. This is what our experiences in France, Italy and Germany demonstrate to us. If they leave Europe to return to Egypt or the African interior, the European habits they have acquired make their keep as expensive as that of the Missionaries and Religious.
[3563]
I can already point out to you the advantages I discovered in opening Institutes in El Obeid for the education of Africans of both sexes. In the capital of Kordofan, an African boy or girl costs from 80 to 150 francs, and 100 francs per year are sufficient for food and clothing. By remaining in his native land, the African develops his full strength.
[3564]
Without changing his way of life, he receives Christian instruction under the direction of the Missionaries or the Sisters and can become an instrument of the apostolate among his compatriots.
Lastly, he preserves his spirit of submission, or I would willingly say, his spirit of humility, while the African who returns from Europe brings back to Africa pretensions to European ideas.

[3565]
From this, I conclude that by spending 10,000 francs, for example, a greater number of Africans can be trained more successfully in El Obeid, Khartoum, Gabon, Zanzibar, etc., than if they were trained in Cairo, France or Italy, at the cost of 100,000 francs. Thus an African brought up in Africa costs ten times less than an African brought up in Europe and, in addition, can be usefully employed for the apostolate of his own nation.
[3566]
I belong to the Institute of Verona which has educated more than 50 African boys and girls, and I have tried doing the same thing in Cairo. This double experience has enabled my Missionaries and myself to verify the exactitude of these observations.
[3567]
Moreover, God inspires the various works of the apostolate and, in the ever adorable decrees of His Providence, all these works serve for His glory and are as many rings linked together to achieve the perfection of His plans. If we had not seen Africans in Europe, perhaps we would not have had the vocation to evangelise Central Africa; perhaps, too, Catholic charity would not have developed as it has at present, for the benefit of the poor Africans.

Daniel Comboni


Translated from the French.

[3568]
“Colonel Gordon followed Sir Samuel Baker as governor general of the White Nile and the Equator. He is now in Khartoum, and the great Pasha brought him here to pay me a visit. The new governor seems to me equal to his difficult and great task. He must conquer all these lands as far as beyond the Equator. He has already been to Gondokoro. I spoke to him about slavery, and, on this point, he professes the most human sentiments. Perhaps he will succeed in this undertaking of civilisation, which would make the evangelisation of those unknown regions easier. The building of the Sisters’ house and the establishments depending on it are making good progress. From January, work on them has never ceased. I have absolutely recovered from fracturing my arm, and all that is left is a little weakness, which does not prevent me from carrying out my duties”.

(Daniel Comboni)

[3569]
I am infinitely grateful to you, Mr President for the 9,600 francs you had the kindness to send me with your letter of 23rd December 1873, from the funds for the year 1873. I hope that the Superior of the Institutes for Africans in Cairo, Fr Bartolomeo Rolleri, who is my representative in Egypt, will have acknowledged receipt of this sum. In the hope of soon giving you fresh news of this vast Mission which you nourish, I offer you my most heartfelt thanks on behalf of my Missionaries who never cease to pray for all the Members of the Central Councils and all the Members of this divine Work.
Nevertheless please deign to accept, Mr President, the homage of my deep veneration, as I have the honour to sign myself
Your most devoted servant

Daniel Comboni
Pro-Vicar Apostolic of Central Africa


Translated from the French.

[3570]
Following the printed Circular and Your Excellency’s precious letter of 3rd March last, both in Khartoum and in the capital of Kordofan two solemn Offices have been celebrated with a solemn Requiem Mass. One was public, which the Imperial Royal Austro-Hungarian Consul attended in full regalia with the entire Catholic population. The other was private, for members of the Mission and both Institutes and the most devout and fervent Catholics. They were celebrated here in Khartoum and in El Obeid. Without calculating the prayers which the Institutes introduced morning and evening in the ordinary exercises of devotion, all the Priests, at my invitation, celebrated five Masses each for the soul of the venerable deceased.
[3571]
But already that great soul who spent himself for the glory of God and the salvation of souls and who served the cause of the Church and the Pope with such zeal and constancy, was so sincerely and deeply pious and bore with such resignation and admirable patience the serious discomforts of blindness, that great soul is not in need of prayers for his eternal repose; and I am absolutely convinced that as soon as he left that body consumed by his efforts, he rapidly took flight to heaven, to receive the reward he deserved for his extraordinary virtues. However, my heart will long grieve, because the benefits and salutary lessons I received from the late Cardinal were many; neither shall I ever be able to forget his venerable name.
[3572]
Nonetheless the Lord in his mercy has greatly assisted our Holy Father in giving him a worthy successor in the person of the Most Eminent Cardinal Franchi, with whom, as I am very pleased to hear, the officials and employees of the Sacred Congregation of Propaganda are delighted and comforted. I must however, prepare myself for another sorrow; that is, that the senior office of Secretary of Propaganda will also soon be vacant, due to Your Excellency’s promotion to the Cardinalate. This should give me joy, seeing all your merits worthily crowned. But my sorrow is consoled and relieved by the idea that the former Secretary of a Congregation becomes a cardinal member of it by right: thus Your Excellency will still remain an active part of this Sacred College of Propaganda.
[3573]
I am warmly grateful to the bounty of Your Most Reverend Excellency for the kind welcome you gave my Vicar General, Fr Carcereri, and especially for convincing Fr Guardi not only to permit the two good fathers Carcereri and Franceschini to continue helping me, but further, to let me have some other members of that Order. In this regard, on the basis of a few ideas described to me by Fr Carcereri (which are substantially what he and I have discussed several times) I am drafting a Convention that I shall submit to the Sacred Congregation. This unexpected help reaches me most opportunely, in this period when, by divine disposition, ways to the African Interior are opening up. And the most reliable hopes of establishing the faith for ever in these remote regions are shining before me. So I thank Your Excellency for your keen commitment to this important Vicariate’s concerns.
[3574]
I will write to you shortly about many things. I have not done so until now because I am extremely busy, day and night. In Kordofan, the Sisters of St Joseph are mistresses of the field and do a world of good. My building work in
Khartoum is already nearing completion. It seems that God’s blessing is truly triumphant. It is all the work of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
I kiss your sacred right hand, and declare myself with all respect and gratitude
Your Excellency’s most devoted son

Daniel Comboni