Nathanael Alberione, the young man from Cordoba was in coma for 50 days due to the covid in 2021. For him and as well as the Church, 21 November was a great day as he was ordained a priest. Pope Francis also encouraged him to be a “priest of the peripheries”.
The new 33-year-old priest is incardinated in a Patagonian diocese, where until now he has served as a diaconate.
A large audience of faithful was present in the ceremony and was presided over by the Bishop of Comodoro Rivadavia, Msgr. Joaquín Gimeno Lahoz, was concelebrated by several prelates from the Patagonia-Comahue region.
Thousands of faithful from various places prayed for the health of the man from Cordoba when, in April 2021, his Covid-19 condition worsened until he fell into a coma that lasted 50 days. Hence the news of his ordination caused a great matter of joy to all.
“The word thank you falls short in a life situation like this, but unfortunately we don’t have another word that we can use to thank,” Nathanael acknowledged in a radio interview with the Conversations space of Radio Divina Providencia.
Regarding his experience with the disease, he explained that there are two levels from which you can think about what happened.
“At the first moment I took it as an adolescent, as a revenge: from being prostrate to learning to walk again, to speak, perhaps there was a question with a bit of arrogance: who is going to keep me still now, after having been through this?”
“Afterwards one evolves and what remains is: This difficulty is nothing compared to others, and it seems to me a wiser look. I really find it very enlightening not to take it so much from the rematch.”
At one point in his life, Nathanael recalled, “I prayed that if I didn’t have to be a priest, I would die.”
The day they explained to him the complex situation he was going through for his health, “before I fell asleep I said: you can see I don’t have to be a priest,” he recounted.
“The fact that I woke up and assimilated the days that I had spent in a coma, was a response. It has certainly been a turning point in my life, a starting point, ” he admitted.
The new priest said that “to this day I continue to meet people who prayed for me, and I always ask myself how to respond, always freely, because it is an invitation that Jesus makes me.”
Referring to the fruits of so many prayers, he encouraged “not to focus so much on the request, on the form, on the structure or on the quantity, but always think who we ask, think about the answer, and the answer is Jesus himself ”.
“Just as some of us have gotten out of survival situations like this, there are others who have been left on the road, and the question is why others have, and why not me… And how many have prayed for those others as well. So, not having the answer in lower case, I go to the answer in upper case, which is Jesus himself.
At the ordination ceremony, which had to be held at the Municipal Stadium No. 1 in Puerto Madryn, because the expected attendance exceeded the capacity of all the temples, the new priest received a special surprise.
Pope Francis expressed his closeness to the young man with a letter in which he invited him to be a “periphery priest”, and affirmed that “it is always better than being in the center, because reality is seen better from there”.
“Do not forget your roots nor the look of Jesus who called you”, advised the Holy Father. “I ask the Virgin to protect you, take care of you and pamper you, and please do not forget to pray for me,” he concluded.