Father Joseph Bragotti

A Comboni Missionary priest for more than 45 years, Father Joseph Bragotti has been serving in San Luís de Petén, Guatemala, since last January. He first came to the area for two months in 2007.

"It was love at first sight," he told The Catholic Telegraph, "so much so that I asked to be permanently assigned to this parish."

COURTESY PHOTO

Comboni Missionary Father Joseph Bragotti rides or walks to the most remote parts of his parish in San Luís de Petén, Guatemala.

s. The parish of San Luis, where Father Bragotti lives, covers 1,200 square miles of forests, farms, mountains and rivers and ministers to about 110 village communities, mostly Mayan.

"Being the senior member of the team and not knowing the local Mayan language, I have been put in charge of only 25 communities, and they are mostly Spanish-speaking," Father Bragotti said. "It takes me about a month-and-a-half to do the rounds. My brethren have more than 30 each. This arrangement keeps us on the go most of the time. We spend time together on Mondays and then take off for the wild for most of the week."

His community consists of four priests and a brother.

Traveling by four-wheel-drive vehicles — and riding horses or walking in the most remote areas — Father Bragotti’s farthest chapel in the East to the border with Belize is 30 miles away, while the farthest chapel in the west is 50 miles.

"The (chapel) at the border is built on shaky grounds," he said. "Nobody really knows where the border is, and my theory is that the chapel where I say Mass is in Guatemala, but the outhouse across the yard is in Belize.

Like most parishes, San Luis depends on volunteers. A woman recently helped 23 children, all above 10 and some in their teens, prepare for their first Communion. Others keep the building safe and clean, while still more people volunteer to visit the sick.

"The religious neglect over the years, the persecution, the poverty, have left people with a real thirst for the sacred," Father Bragotti said. "Many Mayan Christian communities have ‘invented’ their own cocktail of rituals, since we share an innate respect for the sacred, for life and for nature. People in general expect the priest to do primarily the priestly thing. I truly enjoy doing it, because most of my life has been spent away from parish work."

The parish has an alternative agriculture commission that encourages additional crops and new farming methods, which leads to new hope in finding ways to make a living in Guatemala instead of going to the United States.

There is also a scholarship program that insures that deserving students, especially girls, will earn an education and escape poverty and neglect. A clinic, run by a young couple of Comboni lay missioners, is part of the parish. The man is a general practitioner and she is a dentist.

"If we had more medical people around, we could start a program of health education and prevention to fight rotten teeth, diabetes, undernourishment, to name but some of the most common illnesses," Father Bragotti explained.

In light of conflicts with the local population, deforestation, and depletion of the soil, the poor in the area have limited options to make a living. They can either work for wealthy ranchers, or travel the United States.

"Practically, all the families I know have someone working in the states," Father Bragotti noted. "At Mass we daily name parishioners who are either already there or are on their way. To travel north one has to pay around U.S. $4,000 to a people trafficker, a coyote, as they call them here."

The region also contends with violence from drug trafficking, endemic government corruption and inefficiency, years of war and genocide, the widening gap between rich and poor, and religious conflict.

"Despite all of the above, the people of Petén are a very likeable, hospitable, kind and enduring lot," Father Bragotti explained. "I feel honored to be able to serve them and share their lives even in a small way. I also feel very safe. The Catholic communities enjoy a vigorous, albeit simple spiritual life." — David Eck