Bantwal: Mogarnard parish was in a joyful mood and on their toes celebrating the platinum jubilee of the birthday of their parish priest Fr Mathias Periera.

A grand celebration was organised to celebrate this occasion on Sunday January 24 at Deva Matha English Medium School Grounds. Thousands of people witnessed this event. Assistant parish priest Fr Nelson Pais and his team worked day and night to make the event a memorable one.

Fr Mathias Pereira is the last son among eleven children of late Magdalene and Jacob D'Souza of Ramasamudra near Karkala of Miyar Parish. He was born on January 20, 1941. He belongs to a very poor agricultural family.

After matriculation he went to Mumbay and began his career. His urge to serve the downtrodden made him join the Capuchins. The Capuchins in those days were known to live a very hard life and one of fasting. His mother and sister-in-law forced him to join Mangalore Diocesan seminary, but his inner voice to serve the poor did not change. He was ordained priest on December 31, 1970 and worked as an assistant parish priest at Valencia Church for two years.

Within two years of his priesthood he was given the responsibility of parish priest of Pavoor Church. This church is the only church that belongs to tulu speaking dalit Christians of the Mangaluru diocese.

Here Fr Mathias had ample opportunities to serve the marginalised. He worked day and night with the dalits to uplift their social and financial status. His vision was to educate them in the right direction so that they can stand along with the other citizens of our nation. He introduced to them Government schemes. He built them houses. He provided education to them. His service was not only for Christians but to the dalits of all religions. That was the most satisfying experience of my life says Fr Mathias.

After serving for seven years he was transferred to Arva parish as a parish priest in the year 1979. Even in this parish he had lots of dalits, poor and downtrodden families. After serving for six years he was appointed parish priest of Paladka Parish in the year 1985.

The first thing that he did at Paladka was to build a boundary for the entire land and start agriculture. He cultivated a green coconut farm, visited all the poor families of the parish and settled their disputes. He worked for their social and financial upliftment. Building up the families was his main goal.

As a project of platinum jubilee of Paladka parish he took up the project of the new building of the church school and a church at Saverapura. He became very popular here that the parishioners never allowed him to move out of this parish. After serving 11 long years he was transferred for missionary work at Bidar. After serving for three years he was appointed as the director of Gurpur Agricultural School for one year.

In the year 1998 he was appointed as parish priest of Mulky. Apart from the pastoral work he built a beautiful new church, Belfry and the house for the priest. After serving for six years he was appointed parish priest of Bajpe in the year 2004. Here he built a Sauharda nagar, a chapel and a commercial complex. In 2012 he was transferred to the present Mogarnard Parish.

Though Fr Mathias is completing 75 years his zeal and enthusiasm to work for the people have not diminished. He has carried out lots of development activities here. Lots of changes have been made to improve the quality of education at St Antony Higher Primary School, St Antony High School and Deva Matha English Medium School and High School. He has also constructed a new building for the school. The celebration of 125 years jubilee of the church was held in a very grand way.

The parishioners celebrated the 75th jubilee of Fr Mathias Pereira in a big way. As Fr Mathias slogged all his life for the upliftment of the poor and render his service in educating the people, the parishioners have created an education fund to make this celebration a meaningful one. The bishop of Mangaluru Fr Aloysius Paul D'Souza presided over the celebrations.