{"id":50306,"date":"2017-09-19T15:18:00","date_gmt":"2017-09-19T13:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www1.romereports.com\/2017\/09\/19\/priest-freed-after-18-months-of-abduction-i-thanked-god-for-each-new-day-of-life\/"},"modified":"2017-09-19T15:18:00","modified_gmt":"2017-09-19T13:18:00","slug":"priest-freed-after-18-months-of-abduction-i-thanked-god-for-each-new-day-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/2017\/09\/19\/priest-freed-after-18-months-of-abduction-i-thanked-god-for-each-new-day-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Priest freed after 18 months of abduction: \"I thanked God for each new day of life\""},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Fr.<\/strong> <strong>Tom Uzhunnalil<\/strong> is now free after 18 months of <strong>abduction <\/strong>in Yemen. Sixty-six pounds lighter and with his mind psychologically pushed to the limit, the <strong>Salesian missionary<\/strong> burst into tears as he remembered the four Missionaries of Charity and 12 elders killed during his abduction.<\/p>\n<p><strong>FR. TOM UZHUNNALIL<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>\u201cAfter God, of course, before thanking the Lord, I see the Missionaries of Charity.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n<p>The priest says that his abductors <strong>did not mistreat him<\/strong> and he could not find out to which terrorist group they belonged, or if they belonged to one.<\/p>\n<p>He says that he spent his days praying, thanking <strong>God <\/strong>for every new day of life He gave him.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>FR. TOM UZHUNNALIL<br \/>\n<\/strong><em> \u201cI thank God for that day: Yesterday is gone, tomorrow is not sure, give me grace to live this day well. That sometimes and before going to sleep or when night comes and everyone sleeps, I thank the Lord. Morning comes, I thank the Lord for this day. So no other worry was in me.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>After his release, the missionary was transferred to Rome. In the Eternal City he was able to participate in a meeting that he will never forget: one with the <strong>pope<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>FR. TOM UZHUNNALIL<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>\u201cI have not personally come to the Holy Father, Pope Francis, anytime before. The pope is the vicar of Christ and I think in that meeting, the pope kissed my hand and I never deserved it. I'm really grateful to God for his blessings, I'm sure he would have prayed or spent much time for me.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n<p>Fr. Tom will stay in the <strong>Vatican <\/strong>to receive the medical care he needs. As soon as he recovers, he will return to India to serve the people there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>September 19, 2017. Fr. Tom Uzhunnalil recounted his 18 months of hell.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":28478,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[174],"tags":[],"acf":{"video":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/86X4G6CmGks","video_descarga":"http:\/\/attuale.romereports.com\/news\/bfrtomeng.mov","international_url":"http:\/\/attuale.romereports.com\/news\/bfrtomint.mov","type":"bn","newsletter":"si"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50306"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}