By Eddie Albrecht
As far as priestly milestones go, they don’t get much bigger.
The Fremantle Herald last week reported on North Fremantle priest and pastor to the Croatian diaspora in WA, Father Nikola Cabraja, who celebrated 40 years in the priesthood on Sunday, 36 of them in the service of WA’s Croatian community.
As one long-term parishioner pointed out, Fr Nikola has held the community together, a magnetic force much loved by his parishioners who still pack the church to the rafters each Sunday.
In addition to hundreds of regular parishioners, Archbishop Timothy Costelloe SDB, Bishop Don Sproxton, St Patrick’s Basilica parish priest Fr Anthony Mayer and several Croatian priests and Franciscan monks from Sydney helped celebrate Fr Nikola’s milestone.
Armed with a six-week course in English, Fr Cabraja landed in Perth on 15 August 1979, a fresh-faced, 29-year-old keen to embark on a lifetime of pastoral work among the 30,000-strong Croatian community in WA, many of whom live in the greater Fremantle area.
“As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a priest,” the youngest of six children explained. “When I went to church with my mum, I would stare at the priest and imagine myself up there… I never entertained anything else.”
However, his pastoral dream was far from assured when he joined the priesthood.
After graduating from the seminary in 1975, the Church hierarchy wanted to send the newly ordained priest to Rome to become a professor of music, a talent which saw him lead the choir and play organ in Sarajevo, the capital and seat of the Catholic Church in Bosnia.
“I politely declined and asked that I be given a parish because I felt pastoral work was my calling,” Fr Nikola said.
Eventually, he received his break three years after his ordination and was asked to assist in a parish in a small Croatian village called Garevac where the parish priest had taken ill. This posting lasted only seven months and Fr Nikola well recalls his conversation with the priest on the eve of his departure.
“He was a lovely man and said to me ‘what are you doing here?’” Fr Nikola recalled. “This question rocked me because I was finally doing what I wanted to do. Seeing my surprise, he added, you should go out and see the world. I hear they’re looking for a priest in Australia… Brisbane and Perth.”
By morning, the young priest had resolved to come to Australia.
“I remember asking the Archbishop of Zagreb if he could tell me what the weather was like in Brisbane and Perth. He described Brisbane as humid and tropical while Perth was similar to the climate on the Dalmatian coast. I picked Perth straight away.
“I remember arriving at night and, on the way to the parish in North Fremantle, we drove through King’s Park. The shimmering lights of the city impressed me and left me wide-eyed and I recall thinking what a great pIace this must be.”
Fr Nikola’s initial impression has grown into an unshakeable conviction.
“There is something about Australians that I haven’t seen in other people and that’s that they are welcoming… perhaps it’s because we’re all recent arrivals—apart from the Aborigines—and I think it’s in that sense that we are all ‘new’ to this country,” he says.
In his new surrounds, Fr Nikola threw himself into pastoral work and improving amenities.
The church and rectory, in particular, were in a sorry state and, over the years, Fr Nikola, who has earned the reputation for getting things done and being immaculately organised and impossibly talented, has repaired, renovated, restored and improved both buildings.
Fr Nikola is loath to predict what he may do next. He is happy in the service of the Church and the Croatian community and has high praise for the Church in WA.
“I’ve lived through four archbishops and all were very welcoming and hospitable, so much so that I feel more connection to the Church here than that in my birthplace.” – Article courtesy The Fremantle Herald.