From Duga Resa to the Amazon - Meet Father Tomislav, a Missionary at a Turning Point

The life story of Father Tomislav Puškarić, a Salesian priest, belongs to those completely unusual stories of spiritual calling. He entered the Salesian congregation at the age of 34, having felt the calling for missions very early on. "Reading books by missionaries about how they give themselves to other nations, cultures, and customs, it was simply about being able to give myself where no one else wants to go."

Departing for the mission is the culmination of several years of preparation that Father Tomislav Puškarić underwent in Venezuela, where he has been living for the past few years. As a Salesian seminarian, he went through almost everything, getting to know Venezuelan society very well along the way. He was particularly impressed by the work in the favelas of Caracas.

"Caracas is a city with a population similar to that of the entire Croatia, somewhere around 4 million inhabitants, and I would say most of them live in those favelas. On Saturdays and Sundays when I went to do my apostolate, I would go to the favelas called Petare, some of the largest in South America, specifically to an area called La Dolorita. We worked with youth, with families, holding various catechisms for religious education, first communion, confirmation, and for those who wanted to remarry or had been living in common-law relationships," says Father Tomislav.

The latest hardship he experienced was an earthquake that hit northern Venezuela at the beginning of summer. In the days following the earthquake, he even helped dig out survivors alongside a group of seminarians and volunteers.

He is currently on vacation in Croatia, but at the end of September, he returns to Venezuela. He is headed to the Mawaca mission, located deep within the Venezuelan part of the Amazon. The journey to the mission is not an easy one: first, it involves a 16-hour bus ride, followed by a one-and-a-half-hour military plane flight, or, in the worst-case scenario, two weeks by boat traveling 600 km upstream along the Orinoco River. In the mission, Father Tomislav will live with two other priests and three nuns. First evangelization awaits him with the Yanomami people, indigenous inhabitants who have lived along the Orinoco River—the fourth largest river in South America—since time immemorial.

"The first time I arrived there, you see that you've entered an environment that is not our environment. You see that this is a world that is not ours—the nature, insects, animals, all of it is something we cannot see here. But somehow, a human is a human, and I liked working with the youth and the people there; they welcomed me beautifully," Father Tomislav testifies.

For missionaries, one of the key questions is always how to bring the Gospel closer to specific people. Father Tomislav says that the Gospel needs to be proclaimed to the Yanomami people from their own context, rather than a European one. "The Bible has not been translated yet. Some parts of the Gospel and some epistles have been translated, but it needs to be translated from their context. I will give an example: for us, 'Jesus the Good Shepherd' is normal, but they don't know what that means since they have never seen a sheep... a lapa [paca] is a rat-like, timid, humble animal. So, when they depict Jesus as the Good Shepherd, it is with a lapa."

A major pastoral and life challenge lies ahead for Father Tomislav, as he will stay at the mission for three consecutive years. Anyone wishing to help can do so by making a donation to the Croatian Salesian Province with the description "for the Mawaca mission station." We wish Father Tomislav good health and an abundance of blessings and inspiration in his new ministry.

Source: Voice of Croatia

Translated by Branko Lozančić