TESTIMONY OF CONVERSION TO CHRIST OF GIOVANNI BATTISTA TRECCANI (former priest - 2nd cousin of Pope Paul VI

"He tried in vain in the prayers, penances and spiritual exercises of his vocation as a priest to calm the restlessness of his heart. In a simple Pentecostal meeting he found the health of his soul and at present he works as a missionary among the Indians in the South America. ” 

Thus 'Evangelii Harold', the official organ of the Swedish Pentecostal Movement, publishes this news which is both surprising and happy. 

The details concerning this conversion come to us from a Danish writer, Mme Trolly Nrutzsky-Wulff, who lives in Canada and is very active in the Pentecostal Churches. It was at a recent Christian convention in San Diego, California that she met Giovanni Battista Treccani. Here is an extract from the article published by our sister on this event, for which we raise our thanksgiving to God. 

We pray that God's blessing will be on this brother's new ministry in Christ and that his courageous example will help a great number of his old brothers in the Roman Catholic Church to realize this peace of soul that accompanies the gift of salvation in Jesus Christ, gift received in a broken, contrite and penitent heart.


FROM CHILDHOOD HE WAS LOOKING FOR GOD.
Giovanni Battista Treccani was born in Italy into a traditionally religious family. The mother, sister of the present Pope Paul VI, was a devout Catholic, and she was very concerned with the religious formation of her children. Of all, it was on John the Baptist that the Church exercised its greatest influence. It occupied his whole life. From an early childhood, he felt a desire to live close to God. 

Thereafter, he served in the Parish Church as a member of the choir, and performed his duties with great dignity and profound respect. Often he prostrated himself on his knees before the statues of the Virgin Mary and the saints in an avid search for some grace. He was always disappointed.


AT THE SEMINAR.
At the age of adolescence, he felt called to consecrate his life to the service of God. His father objected. Nevertheless, the young Treccani did not allow himself to be diverted from what he considered God's plan for his life. With his mother, he found full understanding; and while he worked in the farms of the district to earn the money necessary for his studies, she saved as much as she could to help her son become a man of the Church.

Finally, one day he was able to enter the seminary to begin his studies. There, he thought, I will find God's peace for my soul and His benevolence on my life; my ardent desire for real communion with him will be fully satisfied.

Open spirit, sincerely submissive to the disciplines of his Church, he spoke to his professors about the distress of his soul. But no one could help him find the communion with God he felt so badly needed. 

Reading the biographies of saints did not bring him any advantage, because he realized that the saints themselves, like him, had been poor human creatures in search of peace. The same father-confessor of the seminary to whom he turned for advice, had to admit that he himself had never known this peace and that therefore he could not help him in this search.

The time spent in the seminary did not give him what he had hoped for; on the contrary, it seemed to him that the restlessness of his soul had increased.


HE WAS NOT GIVEN PERMISSION TO GO AND SEE THE DYING FATHER.
When the father, who over time had accepted the choice made by his son, fell seriously ill, he requested the presence of his son with him, in the hope that he, as a servant of the Church, could help him die in peace. Treccani's superiors refused him permission to go home to his dying father, asserting that a priest belongs first of all to the Church and that family relationships should not affect his priestly obligations.

With deep sorrow in his heart, he bowed to these demands, however finding them inconsistent with the fifth commandment of the Word of God, which recommends that we honor our father and mother. This refusal left a deep wound in the young priest's soul. 


TOWARDS SOUTH AMERICA.
Another career later opened in front of Giovanni Battista Treccani. He wanted to serve God in circumstances that require sacrifice. His uncle, the current Pope Paul VI, at the time archbishop of Milan, to whom he revealed his desire, intervened to support him. And so, following some time, he was sent to serve as coadjutor bishop, in the mountainous region of the Andes in South America.

It was among the poor people he played very meritorious activity and, despite the his heart was always so empty and restless, he devoted himself entirely to this new task, in which the risks were numerous and the work painful.

Thus it was that in that region he encountered an evangelical missionary work for the first time. In principle, he condemned her, because his Church had taught him that she alone was the repository of the Christian Truth. 

But, despite his great devotion to what he considered to be God's cause, he increasingly felt his spiritual poverty and inability to effectively help souls in distress every day. As for seeking help from other priests, he knew by now that their situation was worth his; they all were ignorant of what it means to the peace of God filling a heart.


PLACED IN FRONT OF THE SIMPLICITY OF THE EVANGELICAL WITNESS.
One day, coming out of a chapel where he had paused for some time in prayer before the Virgin Mary, he met an Indian who asked him what he had done in that chapel. At first he felt unwilling to answer: did he, wearing the cassock, have to admit to that Indian that he was in search of God's peace? What a turmoil in his heart! But, yielding to an impulse of the heart, he humbled himself before that man he did not know and replied that he had prayed for peace in his soul. "This is not the right place to pray this prayer," the Indian told him. “You will not be able to find peace except with Jesus”. 

That Indian brother, who had experienced salvation, gave his testimony to that young priest with simplicity, speaking to him of that peace and that joy he had found through faith in Jesus Christ, his Savior.

It was the first time that Treccani had listened to the simple message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and heard about the blood of the Lamb of God which purifies from all sin; and he listened eagerly. Later, the Indian invited him to the meetings; but it was not easy for a Catholic priest to sit among those people whom he had hitherto fought as heretics. 

Nonetheless, he could not resist that power that drew him to them. One day he sat on the last bench in the room, afraid of being recognized by someone.

The Gospel was announced in the fire and power of the Holy Spirit, and Treccani immediately understood that there was what he had sought in vain elsewhere during the long years that had passed. Everything in him answered “Yes” to that very precise message concerning the way of salvation. 

Yes, it could not have been otherwise: God's health is a free gift of divine grace, such a wonderful, infinitely precious gift. The work of salvation is a complete work, men have nothing to add to it. 


TIME OF DECISION.
Days of anguished strife followed that first contact with evangelical Christians. His superiors had learned that he had been in the Evangelical Church and made him understand their disapproval. He tried to remove from himself the influence that encounters with true believers had on him; he gave himself with a doubled zeal in every kind of activity in the Church, so as not to suffer the attraction of the Gospel anymore. 

One day, a great procession had to take place in the city, the statue of a great famous saint had to be taken for a walk through the streets. All the clergy, bishop in the lead, participated in it, to give prestige to the party. That day marked the turning point in Treccani's life. He left the procession to go to the Evangelical Church. There he took his place at the first pew of the humble place and there, finally, he made his encounter with Jesus, the Savior of his soul. The divine peace that he had longed for for many years filled his whole being and he learned in those solemn moments what it means: to be certain of the salvation of the soul. Therefore his disappearance from the procession had been noticed and the bishop together with some priests came to look for him to bring him back to his place. 

But he answered them: "I can no longer follow you, my place is here, at the Cross of Golgotha".
At present, he is a Christian brother, saved by grace. He obeyed Baptism by immersion and the Lord graciously granted him baptism in the Holy Spirit. He is no longer a priest of the Roman Catholic Church. His experiences with the Lord mean that He chose the Truth of God's Word and renounced the traditions of men. He had to pay the price like so many others: contempt, hostility and persecution. 

While he was in Italy for a sojourn, he found one day that evil visitors had sneaked into his room and plundered everything he owned on earth. THE RETURN TO HIS INDIAN FRIENDS.
 


Later, he resumed his activity in the midst of the poor population of the Andes, in the employ of His Savior and Master, who provides for his needs. A profound transformation has occurred in him and his work as a missionary is animated by an immovable faith in God's promises and illuminated by a ray of love and joy. 

Such a testimony also had to exert a salutary influence on the mother. Little by little, the light of the Gospel found the path of his heart. 


THE GIFT OF THE POPE.
The uncle of his brother Treccani has adopted, thanks to the new form of ecumenical government, a benign behavior towards the conversion of his nephew. 

She wrote very affectionately to ask him if there was anything she could do to please him. John the Baptist replied to his uncle that he needed a chalice to celebrate the Holy Supper and a tunic for baptismal services. The Pope sent him the two objects.

As we publish this article, our brother Treccani is in North America where he visits a number of Pentecostal churches. It is something wonderful to hear him speak of the hard path taken towards the revelation of the love of God and of the health offered to us for the redemptive work done on the cross of Golgotha. 

On the face of this man it seems to see a little shining of that same celestial light that illuminated the face of Stephen, the first Christian martyr, in contemplating the face of the Lord Jesus at the right hand of God. He is certainly an instrument chosen by God to bring the name of the Lord to the nations.

May his ministry bring a great number of souls to have the wonderful experience of salvation by faith in Christ Jesus.

___________

The following is the testimony of Giovanni Battista Treccani's conversion to Jesus Christ, transcribed (by his brother Renato Giliberti) from an audio recording made in French Switzerland years ago (October 29, 1989) during a meeting where Giovanni Battista Treccani gave his testimony. ).

THE CONVERSION OF GIOVANNI BATTISTA TRECCANI TOLD BY THE SAME

Video testimony