He left with two confreres, the Filipino Fr Fernandez Rolando and the Yugoslavian Giuseppe Kramar, greeting Manila on the day of the National Holiday. And it was the day of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, “the best omen” as Fr Barbero still remembers now.
He walked among palm forests and swampy waters without brandishing the crucifix: first of all, he had to enter into a relationship with people as they were, befriend them, get to know their culture. He did not set out to baptize entire villages, but to seek traces of God in individuals, to discover their way of reasoning and a possible predisposition to the Christian proclamation.
"I have not converted anyone," he says taking stock of his years so far in Papua New Guinea. In fact, he tilled land so that the sower could intervene at the right time.
The local circumstances he faced are not simple: houses on stilts, a forest stingy with edible products, the presence of a food-drug that creates consequences on health, sharks in the sea, the absence of nearby medical and health facilities ... And also on a social level the situation is not easy: the villagers get sucked into the whirlpools of the big cities; people are willing to help if they have an advantage; the religious proposal itself is evaluated with criteria of material utility ...
As a missionary, that is, an authentic announcer of the Kingdom of God, Fr Barbero is committed to listening, waiting, speaking to individual consciences when the hint of a glimmer shines. And he shares everything with the local population: he has had malaria like most people, he eats canned food as a single meal, he has shared spaces where there is no electricity and the water is full of bacteria ... He has never refused to give a hand or a hug to a leper, has also contracted Hansen's disease, with collateral damage to the nerves still very present today in his feet, so much so that he says that they are the pain of Jesus' nails on the cross.
The first work he put his hand to is a Vocational Training Center which, after years, has become a flagship of the vocational training system throughout the archipelago. In the capital, Port Moresby, he also wanted the presence of the Madonna to be visible with a sanctuary dedicated to Mary Help of Christians to remind us that everything began under her protection.
He celebrated 40 years of mission in Papua New Guinea last summer, while he was in his Novara, where he is still stuck for health reasons. But he wants to return to his chosen homeland as soon as possible, as soon as the provisions against the pandemic allow him.
