Helder Pessoa Camara was born in Fortaleza – Ceará – Brazil, on February 7th 1909. He was the son of Adelaide Rodrigues Pessoa and João Eduardo Torres Camara Filho. She was a primary school teacher, he an accountant. It was up to Mrs Adelaide, a practising Catholic, to initiate her children in the love of God and of their brothers and sisters, and in devotion to the Blessed Virgin, which she did with mastery. She was also their first teacher. Helder liked to say that he was born in a school. Mr. João Eduardo, as a Freemason, lived away from Catholicism. Helder made his first Holy Communion on 29 September 1917.
Priestly Vocation – The Provincial Seminary of Fortaleza or Seminary of Prainha
His priestly vocation began very early, from the age of four or five he spoke of wanting to be a priest. When he was nine, his father, seeing that he still had the same idea, called him for a serious talk, which Dom Helder himself liked to repeat.
“- Son, you are growing up and you keep saying you want to be a priest, but do you know what it means to be a priest?
– Did you know that for a person to be a priest he cannot be selfish, he cannot think only of himself? Being a priest and being selfish is impossible, I know, they are two things that do not go
The priests believe that when they celebrate the Eucharist it is Christ himself who is present. Have you ever thought about the qualities that the hands that directly touch Christ must have?
Helder replied:
– Father, is a priest like you are saying I want to
The boy seemed convinced, and as he had been expressing that desire on a daily basis for years, his father concluded that the best thing to do was to help him get what he wanted.
– So, son, may God bless you! May God bless you! You know we don’t have much money, but even so, I will think how to help you enter the Seminary” (PILETTI e PRAXEDES, 2008, p. 41).
Helder Camara entered the Provincial Seminary of Fortaleza or Seminário da Prainha at the age of 14, where the Lazarist Fathers worked for 99 years forming priests, from 1864 to 1963. During his entire period in the seminary, he had half of his expenses paid by the Obra das Vocações Sacerdotais. According to Hoonaert, 2021, when he arrived, he found Father William Vaessen as rector of the Seminary and was received by him. He was a true missionary. After Father Guilherme’s departure, the rectorship of the seminary was occupied by the French Father Tobias Dequidt. Dom Helder, before his ordination, thought of being a Lazarist, he spoke with Father Tobias, but we do not know the reason why he opted for the secular clergy. At the Seminary of Prainha he finished high school and studied philosophy and theology with excellent results (Doc 1).
Dom Helder was always very grateful to the Fathers of the Mission and the Daughters of Charity for everything he received from them.
On 13 February 1992, he wrote: “At the dear Seminary of Prainha (Fortaleza), I did all the preparatory studies for my priestly ordination. The Seminary was directed by the Lazarist Fathers. Only God knows how much I owe to my Seminary” (Acervo IDHeC).
On February 9, 1992, he wrote to Sister Joana Elizondo, then Superior General. “What I know and what I do, I owe, in great part, to the Fathers of the Mission. Hence the friendship with which I accompany my Masters of yesterday and of always. What they say or do has its roots in faith, in prayer, especially in the Holy Mass. May God bless always the Sons and Daughters of Saint Vincent” (Acervo IDHeC).
On 7 February 1993, thanking the Visitor for a little gift he had sent her on the occasion of her 84th birthday, Dom Helder said: “Sister Visitor and Sisters, truly my Sisters! One of the greatest graces for which I never tire of thanking God is that I did my seminary with the Lazarist masters, sons of St Vincent. And the fineness of God led me to live my priestly old age in the house of the Sisters of Charity, dear daughters of the same Father Saint Vincent! Thank you, Lord! (Acervo FC. Recife).
Priestly ordination.
Dom Helder was ordained on 15 August 1931, at the age of 22. He needed special permission from the Holy See, as the minimum age was 24.
He always celebrated the day of his ordination with great fervour. He said he could not see himself otherwise than as a priest; he wrote in 1945:
“ETERNAL VOCATION
Strange, Sir!
When I compare my hands with those of Francis, I turn pale.
However,
a hundred times I was born a hundred times I would order myself
with eyes closed to my weakness with eyes open
for Your goodness.
Will I trust more in Your Mercy? Will I see less of my sad misery? I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.
Without the priesthood I would not be me. It was easier to be a plant or a stone, an animal or an angel.
It was impossible to be a man,
carry the name I have without the transfiguring title.
Blessed are you
for having made me a priest as You have given song to the birds, shade to the trees, insight to the angels, kindness to Yourself,
O Son of God made man …”.
(Dom Helder Camara. Meditations of Father Joseph, V. 1, p.31).
On the vigil of 7/8.8.1964, remembering people who had marked his priestly life, he wrote: “I have left for the end, the holiest of all (and for this I assure you: there is not the slightest risk of deception). The greatest happiness of my life, the greatest encounter, the greatest example, the greatest stimulus is the personal encounter, the union, the unity with Fr. (CI 68 – Vol II – Volume II p. 206).
Dom Helder, after his priestly ordination, remained in Fortaleza. He was not placed in parishes. As he spoke well and was idealistic, under the archbishop’s guidance he entered politics, even adopting fascist ideas. He wrote for newspapers, gave conferences, was a civil servant and held positions in the state administration.
He soon realized that he was distancing himself from the ideal of priest he dreamed for himself and began to think about how he would get away from Ceará. In 1936, after the death of his mother, he moved to Rio de Janeiro, where he remained until 1964, when he assumed the pastoral care of the Archdiocese of Olinda and Recife.
Gradually he abandoned his fascist ideas and took on the coordination of groups linked to the Catholic Church. However, he was still searching for his path. On 19 July 1943, he turned to Saint Vincent:
“Saint Vincent, pray for us!
Within your general vocation as a priest and saint you hesitated to find
the very particular way
that Providence would have you tread
– you travelled through Africa in the hands of Turks you were vicar of Clichy and Chatillon…
Ask God
that within the Great Path
I will find my way”. (Collection Letters – Virgínia Cortes de Lacerda – Collection of the IDHeC).
Auxiliary Bishop of Rio de Janeiro (1952-1964)
In 1952 he was appointed Bishop of Salde in Africa, to serve as Auxiliary Archbishop of Rio de Janeiro, a service he exercised until 1964. About his episcopal motto: “In manus Tuas”, he wrote:
“In manus Tuas Só Tu
and nobody else
could blow on me such a happy motto, that sums up at every instant, my total misery
and my wealth in Thy hands, I ask nothing and refuse nothing.
I dare not and fear nothing. You decide for me.
You act for me.
In manus Tuas – II
I have the confidence to tell you
that one of the purest tributes I pay You is to accept, at every moment,
not seeing an inch in front of my eyes. What direction will my life take?
What will happen in five years? In one year?
In an afternoon?
In an hour?
In a second?…” (PILETTI and PRAXEDES, 2008, p. 165).
This period was marked by important events: the installation of the National Conference of the Bishops of Brazil – CNBB on 14 October 1952, in the Palácio São Joaquim, in Rio de Janeiro, with Dom Helder Camara as the main organiser and first secretary general.
The 36th International Eucharistic Congress was another milestone for Brazil, revealing Dom Helder’s capacity for articulation and planning, who assumed the General Secretariat of the Congress. During the Congress, (25.7.1955 to 4.8.1955) the first Conference of the Latin American Episcopate was held, and the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM) was created, conceived by Dom Manoel Larraín, with Dom Helder as one of its founders.
The time of the turnaround.
After the Eucharistic Congress Dom Helder decided to show the beautiful city of Rio de Janeiro to Cardinal Pierre-Marie Gerlier (1880-1965), Archbishop of Lyon in France. At one point, after praising Dom Helder’s organisational talent, which he described as exceptional, and after speaking of the splendour of the Congress in contrast to the conditions in which the poor in Rio de Janeiro lived, the Cardinal challenged Dom Helder:
“Why, dear brother Dom Helder, don’t you put all that talent for organisation that the Lord has given you at the service of the poor? You know that Rio de Janeiro is one of the most beautiful cities in the world, but it is also one of the most frightening, because all those favelas, in this picture of such beauty, are an insult to the Creator […]. Dom Helder considered the Cardinal’s reflection as a new challenge. He took Cardinal Gerlier’s hands in his, kissed them and said: ‘This is a turning point in my life. You will be able to see my consecration to the poor. I am not convinced that I possess exceptional skills as an organiser, but all the gift that the Lord has entrusted to me I will place at the service of the poor'”. (PILETTI e PRAXEDES. 2008, p. 200).
The fruits of the “turnaround” were soon felt: the creation of the Cruzada de São Sebastião, the urbanisation of the favelas, the construction of flats in noble areas, the Providência Bank and Fair, a pharmacy for the poor and many other initiatives.
