Frei Beto, OP, Theologian and a lifetime companion of Frei Joao Xerri, OP, writes:
The motivation of the liberating faith inspired Frei João (Fr Ġwann) Xerri and his equipe to create in 1982 the Solidarity Group São Domingos, destined to show solidarity with peoples and movements that struggle against any type of colonialism or domination.
In Brazil, the group supported the struggle for agrarian reform and collaborated with the CPT (Pastoral Land Commission), especially in land conflicts in the state of Paraná in the south and in the state of Para in the north of Brazil.
João was present in the region of Conceição do Araguaia when landowners and the military government persecuted the French priests Aristides Camio and François Gouriou. Prisoners from 1981 to 1983, they were later expelled from the country, accused of inciting land occupations to bring about land reform. The army occupied the city and appointed a military chaplain to take over the parish.
Considering such an attitude an affront, the diocese sent Frei João Xerri to Conceicao de Araguaia. There he stayed for some time, despite the risks and threats. At the time, Lília Azevedo, from Frei Xerri’s equipe, published a collection of letters from Fr Aristides, with the very significant title ‘The important thing is the people’.
In 1983, the São Domingos Solidarity Group began its collaboration with the people of South Africa in the fight against ‘apartheid’. It also supported the struggle for freedom of the peoples of Central America and, in particular, of Haiti. Frei João followed, in a special way, the struggle of the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico, which João visited in 1998, in the company of Dom Tomás Balduíno. Among João’s friendly personalities, Desmond Tutu and Xanana Gusmão, leader of the liberation of Timor-Leste and the first president of the free country, stand out.
Since 1993 he had been collaborating with the people of Timor-Leste for their liberation from Indonesia, which took place in 2002, through the Clamor por Timor project. And he hosted, at the Dominican’s convent in São Paulo, one of the main revolutionary leaders, José Ramos-Horta, future chancellor of the liberated country.
With the Grupo Solidário, Frei João took over, since 1993, the annual launch in Brazil of the Latin American Agenda, published in several languages. Produced by Dom Pedro Casaldáliga and his equipe, the Agenda presents facts, dates and names that stood out in the history of the liberation of our continent.
There he stayed... despite the risks and threats
Frei João accompanied me on trips to Nicaragua and Cuba. At this time, he was promoter of Justice and Peace Commission of the Dominican Order in Latin America and the Caribbean, from 1986 to 1992; and, from 1986 to 1994, he was promoter of Justice and Peace of the Dominican Friars in the Southern Cone.
Invited to assume the mission of general prosecutor of Justice and Peace and permanent delegate of the Dominican Order to the UN, Frei João became a member of the General Council of the Order and president of the Interprovincial Conference of Latin America and the Caribbean – CIDALC. For this task, he lived in Rome between 2001 and 2008, and having returned to Malta, after some time, returned to Brazil. In recent years, he was a member of the Dominican family’s Justice and Peace Commission in Brazil and was advisor to the Pastoral Land Commission of the Brazilian bishops.
João took the film Baptism of Blood, based on my book of the same name, around the world. In Lima, in 2007, he exhibited it at the assembly of superiors of Dominican Sisters throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, and to superiors of Dominican friars in the same region. And he wrote to the film’s director, Helvécio Ratton: “For me, one of the great values of the film is that it tells a fact, without justifying it or making it a paradigm. It is not a movie of bad guys and good guys, saints and sinners. It is the narrative of the fact in its full truth, without being apologetic. (...) Another interesting thing, and which has universal value, is the treatment given to the issue of torture, the abomination of torture. Also important, in my view, is the way it handles whistleblowing under torture: this is a taboo that really needs to be faced.
Frei João will be missed. We will no longer see his smile contained. We won’t see him walking like a sailor on deck, his body swaying slightly as if his shoulders weighed him down. Nor will we see him raise his hoarse, powerful voice and his right hand when a situation aroused vehement indignation.
However, we will keep in memory his legacy as a militant of all just, libertarian causes, whether it was the workers’ struggle on the outskirts of São Paulo, symbolised by the trade unionist Santo Dias, who was assassinated, and whose family he became friends with; or the right always denied to Palestinians of living in a free and sovereign state.
God has you in his infinite love.