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About the Capuchins

Capuchin Personalities

Over the years, many of the people served by the Capuchins will recall the personality of certain friars with incidents that remain fixed in their memories and grateful for the influence on their lives.

One can scarcely forget Fr. Rudolf Blockinger a Capuchin missionary who, after 30 years spent in harsh and inaccessible places on the China mainland near the Manchurian border, was expelled by the Communists and volunteered to spend his remaining years in Australia. Apart from his earthy and hair-raising stories, he was a delight to listen to. He had the habit of spicing up his Sunday homilies with all sorts of anecdotes and dramatic effects, like the time he began holding a telephone conversation with God in heaven asking if there were any Wynnum parishioners up there. Without fail, when encountering married women, he would ask how many children they had and, normally, the answer was "two". He would reply quizzically: "Only two?" Unmistakably a man of prayer, you could rely on seeing him as early as 3am making his way to the church, there to spend time communing with the Lord as he prepared to celebrate Mass at 6am.

Then there was Fr. Nicholas Simonazzi, the first of the new band of Capuchins that went to Adelaide in 1949. A jovial, extremely active and real extrovert of a man with a strong and melodious voice, he was like a "cat on hot bricks" and profoundly entertaining. His friendliness towards all, without distinction, was such as to capture the admiration of many from other creeds. He sang willingly and participated joyfully at the annual ecumenical Carol Service. Hard "yakka" work was not alien to him. Such was exemplified when he lent his own hands to building, through volunteer labour, the church-hall of St. Francis of Assisi at Newton, then known as Campbelltown. He always drew a chuckle from the people he met when introducing himself as "old Nick from paradise".

Who, in the Italian community of Sydney, hasn't heard of Fr. Silvio Spighi? After enduring the rigours, austerity and very poor conditions of the pioneer stages in Halifax, North Queensland, he subsequently found himself in the priestly post of "hatching, matching and dispatching" the hordes of Italians that came to him during his assignment at Leichhardt and Plumpton. Hilarious by nature, he easily won the confidence of those that had anything to do with him. Even when he was in his 80's he was constantly on the go and available to the needy no matter how inconvenient the time.

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