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July 3, 2006 • VOL. 44, NO. 13 • Oakland, CA
Father Andrade
leaves Oakley,
to become pastor in Portugal
For Father
Bernardino Andrade, one of the most cherished aspects of his ministry
as pastor at St. Anthony Parish in Oakley was one of the most hectic –
the weekend Mass schedule.
Each weekend he presided at seven Masses in three different languages.
That’s not counting, the celebration of Quinceaneras, weddings and
an increasing number of confessions. “Sometimes I felt very, very
tired, but I was never bored,” said the priest, who retired from
active ministry in the Oakland Diocese on July 1.
Despite the challenging pace, the 68-year-old priest said he often received
inspiration and spiritual renewal from the community in which he has lived
and prayed for nearly a dozen years. “The number of children that
surround the altar during the Eucharistic Prayer were a great source of
joy and energy for me,” he told The Voice.
He also credited the support he received from the four permanent deacons,
Frank Bustos (now retired), Alan Layden, Chano Perez and Joe Tovar, who
served the parish. “They have been a miracle in my ministry,”
he said.
Last year, on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of his ordination,
Father Andrade paid tribute to members of the Oakley parish for teaching
him so much “about faith, compassion and tolerance and love for
the poor.” He noted, for example, that one family gave him a $200
gift certificate and asked that he take homeless people to a “nice
restaurant on Christmas Day.”
The parish’s growth as a “point of reference” for the
poor in the area is a source of joy for Father Andrade. Through programs
devoted to social justice such as the food pantry, Habitat for Humanity
and People Helping People, parishioners are working to reach out and help
address the concerns of people in need.
The parish’s main goal “is to establish the Kingdom of God
and transform this world where we live into a loving, just and compassionate
family (Catholics, Protestants, rich, poor, homeless) with a special preference
for those who are ‘the most repugnant,’” he said.
The priest doesn’t mince words when describing what he sees as troubling
attitudes of some people to the increasing poverty and homelessness in
parts of eastern Contra Costa County. He pointed out that a neighboring
community recently declared war against the homeless and that one of the
reasons cited in a local newspaper was that the homeless “frighten
people with their appearance.”
“Do you believe this? It is really scary,” Father Andrade
said.
Father Andrade’s advocacy for the poor and marginalized can be traced
back to his own childhood on Madeira Island in Portugal. He grew up in
a poor village that did not offer a secondary school education.
“The poor didn’t choose. They just followed the traditions
of the family, and the traditions of my family and my people was farming
in the worse conditions you can imagine,” he said. “If I had
not been a priest, I don’t think I would have passed beyond elementary
school.”
It was his mother who planted the seed of a religious vocation into his
heart, Father Andrade said. She asked her then 12-year-old son, “Wouldn’t
you like to be a priest?” and he answered, “Yes” immediately.
Despite his family’s limited income they came up with the funds
he needed to complete his seminary education. “That was one of those
mysteries that I still don’t understand,” he said. “My
father and my mother did the impossible. They are the greatest saints
in my life.”
As a seminarian in Portugal, he believed that he was called to be a missionary
in Africa. In fact a few priests from his home diocese had gone to Mozambique,
then a Portuguese colony. Included among those Portuguese missionaries
was the spiritual director at the seminary whom Father Andrade considered
a role model. “He was my hero. I always wanted to be like him,”
the priest recalled.
But when he had completed his studies at the seminary, Father Andrade’s
dream was nearly shattered when the seminary’s new superior told
him that he could not be a priest because he was “disorganized in
his dedication to the poor.” The deeply disappointed young man,
however, received reassurance from an aunt who told him that “When
people close a door, God opens a gate.”
His aunt was right. That gate opened when the bishop of the Diocese of
Quelimane in Mozambique invited the former seminary student to his diocese
in 1964 and ordained him to the priesthood in June 1965. Father Andrade
spent nine years in the Quelimane Diocese where, in addition to his pastoral
duties, he worked as a religion teacher.
He came to the East Bay to visit an uncle who had emigrated to the U.S.
years earlier and extended his visa for a few months to receive medical
treatment for a throat problem. During that time he learned of a coup
in Portugal and that Mozambique had become independent and communist.
He decided to stay and work in the Oakland Diocese, serving first as associate
pastor at St. Edward Parish in Newark (1976-81), then as vicar for Portuguese-speaking
Catholics in the diocese, a position he held until 1994.
As he prepared to step down as pastor in Oakley, Father Andrade learned
that another gate had opened. The bishop of Madeira Island has invited
him to be a pastor of a parish there that is full of children, young couples
and many older members. “He also wants me to work with the immigrants
and tourists and say English Masses on a regular basis,” he said.
Father Andrade is excited about his new ministry and the opportunity to
return to Portugal and continue his spiritual journey. “Priesthood
is a mystery that God keeps revealing to me daily, especially when I celebrate
the sacraments and serve the lost, the last and the least,” he said.
“When I read in the Gospel that Jesus called his apostles, just
telling them, ‘Follow me,’ and they did, I can identify with
them.”
Father Bernardino Andrade
