On November 12, 2020, at eighty-six years of age, sixty-nine of religious life and fifty-nine of priesthood, Fr. Gabrijel Badurina, of the Croatian Province of Saint Jerome, of the Convent of San Paolo Abate in Preko (on the islet of Školjić), died at the hospital in Zagreb. He had been convalescing in Odra, Zagreb, in the Convent of Saint Francis since the beginning of 2018.
On January 19, 1935, Fr. Gabrijel was born into a large Catholic family in Lun, island of Pag, to father Romulo and mother Cleofe, born Šanko. He attended the first four years of elementary school in his birthplace. After elementary school, he entered the minor seminary of the Province in 1947. He attended ecclesial classical high school in Zagreb and Split (1947-1955). He later spent two years in the army of the socialist Yugoslavian state. He made his temporary vows in 1952 and his solemn vows in 1958. He was ordained a priest in 1962 in Zagreb. He graduated from the theological faculty of that city in 1963.
At the beginning of his priestly ministry he was parish assistant in Preko (island of Ugljan, near Zadar). Next, he exercised a series of pastoral assignments in the United States, where he spent forty-four years (1966-2009). He was chaplain in the Croatian parish of St. Nicholas in Millvale, Pittsburgh (1966-1970) and during this assignment he received a degree in pedagogy from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh. Later he was pastor of the Croatian Sacred Heart of Jesus parish in McKeesport for many years (1970-1994), missionary for the Croats in Washington (1994-1999), pastor of the Parish of San Niccolò in Millvale (1999-2006) and hospital chaplain and in homes for the elderly (2006-2009). In the Commissariat of the Croatian Province in the United States, he was commissioner for twenty years (1972-1984 and 2001-2009), councilor (1966-1972), first councilor (1984-1994) and treasurer. He was a member of the Board of Directors for the City of McKeesport (1970-1977) and a long-time member of the section of the Croatian Fraternal Union in the same city.
Fr. Gabrijel was a good man and friar, simple, unpretentious, kind and insightful, a man of faith and truly devoted. He was a dear priest and a true patriot who in all his ministries had high esteem for people and his co-workers.
On November 17, the funeral was presided over by Fr. Ivo Martinović, Minister Provincial, assisted by Fr. Antun Badurina, fellow citizen of Fr. Gabrijel and by Fr. Zvonimir Brusač, Provincial Secretary. Also attending were Vlatko, brother of Fr. Gabrijel, his nephews, twenty friars of the Province and a group of parishioners from the Parish of St. Francis Xavier in Zagreb, because epidemiological prescriptions had to be respected. He was buried in the tomb of friars of the Province in the central cemetery of the City of Zagreb.
The funeral Mass in the Hall of Bishop Srećko (Badurina), next to the convent and parish church of Saint Francis Xavier in Zagreb (damaged in the earthquake in March), was presided by the Minister Provincial, assisted by Fr. Božo Sučić, local minister of the Convent of Saint Paul in Preko. In attendance were the friars of the Province and the relatives of Fr. Gabrijel.
Letters of condolence were sent by Monsignor Ivica Petanjak, bishop of Krk, diocese of origin of Fr. Gabrijel, and by Rev. Tomislav Markić, director of the pastoral care of Croatians abroad.