EUROPE/ITALY - Trentola Ducenta Seminary: earthly remains of Blessed Paolo Manna founder of the Pontifical Missionary Union moved to a chapel which bears his name

Tuesday, 13 September 2005

Rome (Fides Service) - On Wednesday 14 September at Sacred Heart Seminary, Trentola Ducenta (CE), there will be a special ceremony for the transfer of the earthly remains of Blessed Paolo Manna, founder of the Pontifical Missionary Union and first Superior General of PIME (Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions) followed by Mass presided by Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples. At least 600 people are expected to attend including, Bishops of the Campania Region, local clergy, PIME missionaries, Secretary General of the PMU Fr. Fernando Galbiati, PIME, and Italian national PMU secretary Fr. Vito del Prete, PIME, representatives of national Italian offices of the Pontifical Mission Societies, missionary animators, men and women religious and faithful.
The remains of Blessed Manna will be moved from the PIME cemetery to a new seminary chapel dedicated to him. The chapel is built in a typical style of archtecture used in Burma where Manna was on mission for 12 years in three periods (between 1895 and 1907). The chapel seats 200 people and is open to the public for Sunday Mass. There are plans to organise a museum dedicated to the missionary work of Fr Manna under the chapel.
Born in 1872 in Avellino, in 1891 Paolo Manna entered the PIME seminary in Milan. He was ordained a priest in 1894 and a year later sent on mission to Burma (today Myanmar), where he spent three periods of mission but poor health forced him to renounce mission and he returned to Italy for good on 7 July 1907. He engaged in intense missionary animation as journalist and author of books as well as the diffusion of initiatives of cooperation. In 1916 he started the Missionary Union of the Clergy, today the Pontifical Missionari Union, described by Pius XII as “the gem of the life of Fr Manna”. In 1921 in Trentola Ducenta (Caserta) he opened a southern seminary for foreign missions. As the first PIME Superior general he visited missions in Asia and the United States. In 1937 he was appointed international secretary of the Missionari Union of the Clergy and in 1943 superior of PIME southern region. He died in Naples 15 September 1952. In 1974 the process for his beatification was started. On 13 November 1990 Pope John Paul II visited the tomb of Manna at Trentola Ducenta and declared him Blessed on 4 November 2001. (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 13/9/2005 righe 32, parole 437)


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