Father Manuel João Pereira Correia, a Comboni missionary, has been living with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) for 13 years, a disease that he tries to face with a missionary spirit, serenity and with the “gift of a smile”. Br. Tomek Basinski, a Polish Comboni missionary.
How was your missionary vocation born?
My missionary vocation… was born with me! Since I was a child, I have felt the desire to be a priest, perhaps due to the influence of my mother who, when I was very small, during Holy Mass, asked me, “Manuelino, wouldn’t you like to be a priest?” This desire grew with me, so much so that when they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I answered with conviction: “I want to be a priest!” When I was ten, in elementary school, a Comboni Missionary came and spoke to us enthusiastically about the missionary vocation. After his talk, he asked us who wanted to go to Africa with him. Nobody raised their hand. Me neither, out of shyness. The teacher, who perhaps had guessed that I could be a “candidate”, called me during the interval and introduced me to that vocation promoter. A few months later, I was accepted into the seminary. And so, my vocation as a Comboni priest was born. The conviction to give my definitive “yes” to the Lord has become for me a “promise of meaning”: “I will always be with you to give meaning to your life!” This promise has always accompanied me and illuminated the difficult moments of my life. A few days before my ordination, my father confided in me that, at the moment of my conception (I am the eldest son), my parents had made a kind of prayer or consecration: “O Lord, if our first child will be a boy, we offer him to you as a priest!” There is also another confidence from my mother that moved me deeply but I jealously keep it! In a certain sense, I see myself in Jeremiah’s vocation, with doubts, fears and shyness but called by God from the womb!
You worked in different communities and countries until 2010 that forced you to return to Europe. What happened?
I started having difficulty in walking and was wondering what it was. At first, I thought about lack of exercise. When it was clear that it was something else, I went to a neurologist, who advised me to go back to my country Portugal immediately for tests and gave me a letter in a sealed envelope to present to one specialist. When I got home, I opened it and read the verdict. Probable diagnosis: Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis ALS). In Lisbon, this diagnosis was confirmed. When I asked the doctor what the evolution of the disease would be, he replied: “Very simple: first you will walk with clutches, then in a wheelchair, then …” I returned to Africa (Togo) to finish the last months of my service as head of the Comboni Missionaries in West Africa (Togo, Ghana and Benin) and at the end of the year, I returned to Europe.
How did you react when you got the doctor’s diagnosis?
The first night I cried a little, I confess but then the Lord gave me a grace I didn’t expect; a great serenity. I asked myself why this misfortune had happened to me but I immediately gave myself the answer: “And why shouldn’t it have happened to me? Am I perhaps privileged?” I often thought about it when I would be completely trapped in my body but a certainty gave me peace: “I won’t be alone. The Lord will be a prisoner within me!” I was also thinking about the possibility of remaining completely isolated from external reality, but another conviction grew within me: “I will always have the possibility of living in the inner world that is in the cathedral of my heart!”
Your ministry has certainly changed as your illness has progressed…
Yes, absolutely. At first, I expected to live a few years at most. Since the Lord has given me a few more years (more than twelve years have already passed!), I thought of giving my small contribution in the field of ongoing formation of the confreres, creating a blog and sharing formation material with them. I also offered to collaborate with some groups, giving my testimony and cultivating friendships.
How do you live your missionary vocation?
I love life and I like to repeat that life is beautiful! I try to convey this sense of wonder to the people around me. I continue to be interested in the world and to follow the life of society, of the Church and of the mission. I do it out of passion and to continuously update my blog (www.comboni2000.org).
You once said that your wheelchair has become a pulpit for you… What did you mean?
I truly believe that my wheelchair is the pulpit God gave me to proclaim the Word of God. I believe that our “cross” is the most appropriate place to proclaim the Word. I see myself as the prophet Jonah in the belly of the whale, leading me where God wants me to go. I sail in the sea of life, between the two shores of him. From one eye of the whale, I look at life on this shore, from the other eye, I see the other shore that awaits us, in the fog of faith and hope.
Since 2018, you are completely paralyzed. How do you experience dependence on others?
It’s my way of living my vow of poverty: being in need and having to ask for everything! But it’s also a way to cultivate gratitude for every little thing. Besides, thanking God for all the people who generously help me, I always try to reciprocate with a smile on my lips and a blessing in my heart.
You are motionless, yet you manage to communicate with others, as you do now
I mostly communicate with my eyes, the only part of my body that I can still move. I write with my eyes, thanks to a computer with special software that “reads” the movements of my eyes. One of the many wonders of technology!
Sometimes people who experience sickness and suffering feel pain and anger towards God. What is your relationship with God today?
When the Lord visited me with illness, I spontaneously exclaimed: “Lord, you are a thief!” Every time, it took something away from me. Then, I discovered that he is a very special thief: he never takes anything away from us without leaving us something more precious! In sickness, I discovered God’s generosity!
What would you say to people who have lost hope and are unhappy in their suffering and sickness?
I would say that life is always an opportunity! Life never closes a door without opening another. Of course, there are particularly tragic moments that are difficult to accept and manage. For the believer, it is the hour of hope and faith in the triumph of life, of which the cross and death are the gestation. To the non-believer, I’d say trust your instinct for the beauty of life. This too is a path of hope that leads us, albeit unknowingly, to Life!
