| Revision as of 18:30, 9 July 2007 editAttilios (talk | contribs)Autopatrolled, Extended confirmed users, Pending changes reviewers172,812 edits Revert to revision 143520808 dated 2007-07-09 16:03:29 by Attilios using popups← Previous edit | Revision as of 18:40, 9 July 2007 edit undoEvrik (talk | contribs)Autopatrolled, Extended confirmed users, Pending changes reviewers, Rollbackers88,476 edits reverting insertion of POV text per discussion pageNext edit → | ||
| Line 45: | Line 45: | ||
| One friend was Justice Minister ], who did not support the Church, but nevertheless recognized the value of Don Bosco’s work. While Rattazzi was pushing a bill through the Sardinian legislature to suppress religious orders, he advised Don Bosco on how to get around the law and found a religious order to keep the Oratory going after its founder’s death. Bosco had been thinking about that problem, too, and had been slowly organizing his helpers into a loose “Congregation of St. Francis de Sales”. He was also training select older boys for the priesthood on the side. Another supporter of the religious order idea was the reigning Pope, ]. | One friend was Justice Minister ], who did not support the Church, but nevertheless recognized the value of Don Bosco’s work. While Rattazzi was pushing a bill through the Sardinian legislature to suppress religious orders, he advised Don Bosco on how to get around the law and found a religious order to keep the Oratory going after its founder’s death. Bosco had been thinking about that problem, too, and had been slowly organizing his helpers into a loose “Congregation of St. Francis de Sales”. He was also training select older boys for the priesthood on the side. Another supporter of the religious order idea was the reigning Pope, ]. | ||
| In 1854, when the ] was occupied in a discussion of whether the state had the right to confiscate ecclesiastical properties, Bosco spread a series of dreams which forecast the death of members of the Savoy court or of politicians striving for the ]. His activity, which had been described as having "manifest blackmailing intentions,"<ref>{{cite journal|journal=Medioevo|date=June 2007|first=Erberto|last=Petoia|pages=p. 70|title=I sinistri presagi di Don Giovanni Bosco}}</ref> ended only after the intervention of Prime Minister ]. | |||
| In 1859, Bosco selected the experienced priest Don Alasonatti, 15 seminarians and 1 high school boy and formed them into the “Society of St. Francis de Sales”. This was the nucleus of the Salesians, the religious order that would carry on his work. When the group had their next meeting, they voted on the admission of Joseph Rossi as a lay member, the first Salesian brother. The Salesian Congregation was divided into priests, seminarians and “coadjutors” (the lay brothers). | In 1859, Bosco selected the experienced priest Don Alasonatti, 15 seminarians and 1 high school boy and formed them into the “Society of St. Francis de Sales”. This was the nucleus of the Salesians, the religious order that would carry on his work. When the group had their next meeting, they voted on the admission of Joseph Rossi as a lay member, the first Salesian brother. The Salesian Congregation was divided into priests, seminarians and “coadjutors” (the lay brothers). | ||
Revision as of 18:40, 9 July 2007
"John Bosco" redirects here. For other uses, see Bosco (disambiguation).| St. John Bosco | |
|---|---|
| File:Portret bosko.jpgGiovanni Bosco | |
| Holy Hierarch | |
| Born | August 16 1815 Castelnuovo, Piedmont, Italy |
| Died | January 31, 1888, age 72 Turin, Italy |
| Venerated in | Catholic Church |
| Beatified | 1929 |
| Canonized | 1934 |
| Major shrine | The Tomb of St John Bosco - Basilica of Our Lady Help of Christians, Turin, Italy |
| Feast | January 31 |
| Attributes | Educator, Minister |
| Patronage | Christian apprentices, editors, and publishers |
Saint Don Bosco, born Giovanni Melchiorre Bosco, and known in English as John Bosco (August 16 1815 – January 31 1888), was an Italian Catholic priest, educator and recognized pedagogue, who put in practice the dogma of his religion, employing teaching methods based on love rather than punishment. He placed his works under the protection of Francis de Sales; thus his followers styled themselves the Salesian Society. He is the only Saint with the title "Father and Teacher of Youth".
Bosco succeeded in establishing a network of centres to carry on his work. In recognition of his work with disadvantaged youth he was canonized by the Catholic Church in 1934 .
Early life
Giovanni Bosco was born in Cascina Biglione, a frazione of Castelnuovo d'Asti, in Piedmont (then part of the Kingdom of Sardinia).
Don Bosco began as the chaplain of a girls’ boarding school founded in Turin by the Marchioness di Barolo, called the Rifugio ("Refuge"). But he had many ministries on the side such as visiting prisoners, teaching catechism and helping out at country parishes. A growing group of boys would come to the Rifugio on Sundays and feast days to play and learn their catechism. They were too old to join the younger children in regular catechism classes in the parishes, which mostly chased them away. This was the beginning of the “Oratory of St. Francis de Sales”. Because of all their disorderly racket, the Marchioness spared her girls the distraction by terminating Bosco’s employment at the Rifugio.
Don Bosco and his Oratory wandered around town for a few years and were turned out of several places in succession. Finally, he was able to rent a shed from a Mr. Pinardi. His mother moved in with him. The Oratory had a home, then, in 1846, in the new Valdocco neighborhood on the north end of town. Next year, he and "Mamma Margaret" began taking in orphans.
Foundation of the Salesian Family
 | Template:Wikify is deprecated. Please use a more specific cleanup template as listed in the documentation. |
 | This article may require copy editing for grammar, style, cohesion, tone, or spelling. You can assist by editing it. (May 2007) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Even before this, however, Don Bosco had the help of several friends at the Oratory. There were zealous priests like Don Cafasso and Don Borel, some older boys like Giuseppe Buzzetti, Michele Rua, Giovanni Cagliero and Carlo Gastini, and Don Bosco’s own mother. Some local politicians helped out while others hindered his efforts.
One friend was Justice Minister Urbano Rattazzi, who did not support the Church, but nevertheless recognized the value of Don Bosco’s work. While Rattazzi was pushing a bill through the Sardinian legislature to suppress religious orders, he advised Don Bosco on how to get around the law and found a religious order to keep the Oratory going after its founder’s death. Bosco had been thinking about that problem, too, and had been slowly organizing his helpers into a loose “Congregation of St. Francis de Sales”. He was also training select older boys for the priesthood on the side. Another supporter of the religious order idea was the reigning Pope, Pius IX.
In 1859, Bosco selected the experienced priest Don Alasonatti, 15 seminarians and 1 high school boy and formed them into the “Society of St. Francis de Sales”. This was the nucleus of the Salesians, the religious order that would carry on his work. When the group had their next meeting, they voted on the admission of Joseph Rossi as a lay member, the first Salesian brother. The Salesian Congregation was divided into priests, seminarians and “coadjutors” (the lay brothers).
Next, he worked with Don Pestarino, Mary Mazzarello and a group of girls in the hill town of Mornese. In 1871, he founded a group of religious sisters to do for girls what the Salesians were doing for boys. They were called the “Daughters of Mary Help of Christians”. In 1874, he founded yet another group: the “Salesian Cooperators”. These were mostly lay people who would work for young people like the Daughters and the Salesians, but would not join a religious order.
The story of the departure of the first Salesians for America in 1875 is based on the missionary ideal of Don Bosco. All his life he wanted to be a missionary, and his biographer mentions that he was already thinking about it when he was a young student at Chieri. After his ordination, he would have become a missionary had not his director, Joseph Cafasso, opposed the idea. He eagerly read the Italian edition of the Annals of the Propagation of the Faith and used this magazine to illustrate his Cattolico provveduto (1853) and his Month of May booklets (1858).
When he founded the Salesian Society, the thought of the missions still obsessed him, and he would gladly have sent his religious had he not then completely lacked the means. Father Lemoyne states that Don Bosco had to be satisfied for a long time to just ardently study the map of the world or to speak to the Oratory boys about the labors of missionaries, or the martyrdom suffered by some of them, or about the people they converted to the Gospel.
About 1871-72 one if his "dreams" encouraged him. He found himself transported to a vast plain, inhabited by primitive peoples, who spent their time hunting or fighting among themselves or against soldiers in European uniforms. Along came a band of missionaries, but they were all horribly massacred. A second group appeared with an air of joy about them; they were preceded by a group of children. Don Bosco at once recognized them as Salesians. Astonished, he witnessed an unexpected change when the fierce savages laid down their arms and listened to the missionaries. The dream made a great impression on Don Bosco, because he tried hard to identify the men and the country of the dream.
It is said that he searched for three years among documents, trying to get information about different countries. For a moment he thought it might be Abyssinia, then Hong Kong, then Australia, then India. One day, however, a request came from the republic of Argentina, which turned him towards the Indians of Patagonia. To his surprise, a study of the people there convinced him that the country and its inhabitants were the ones he had seen in his dream.
He regarded it as a sign of Providence and set about the realization of a project long dear to him. Adopting a special way of evangelization that would not expose his missionaries suddenly to wild, uncivilized tribes, he proposed to set up bases in safe locations where their missionary efforts were to be launched. The above request from Argentina came about as follows: Towards the end of 1874, he received letters from that country requesting that he accept an Italian parish in Buenos Aires and a school for boys at San Nicolas de los Arroyos. Gazzolo, the Argentinean Consul at Savona, had sent the request, for he had taken a great interest in the Salesian work in Liguria and hoped to obtain the Salesians' help for the benefit of his country. Negotiations started after Archbishop Aneiros of Buenos Aires had indicated that he would be glad to receive the Salesians. They were successful mainly because of the good offices of the priest of San Nicolas, Pedro Ceccarelli, a friend of Gazzolo, who was in touch with and had the confidence of Don Bosco. In a ceremony held on 29 January, 1875, Don Bosco was able to convey the great news to the Oratory in the presence of Gazzolo. On February 5, he announced the fact in a circular letter to all Salesians asking volunteers to apply in writing. He proposed that the first missionary departure start in October.
This news aroused great enthusiasm everywhere, and practically all the Salesians volunteered for the missions. Certainly a new era had now begun for the Oratory and the young Society.
By this time Italy was united, with borders similar to those of today, under Piedmontese leadership. The poorly-governed Papal States were merged into the new kingdom. It was generally thought that Don Bosco supported the Pope, but he never commented on politics.
The Preventive System
Don Bosco's capability to attract numerous boys and adult helpers was connected to his "Preventive System of Education". He believed education to be a "matter of the heart," and said that the boys must not only be loved, but know that they are loved. He also pointed to three components of the Preventive System: reason, religion, and kindness. Music and games also went into the mix.
Don Bosco gained a reputation early on of being a saint and miracle worker. For this reason Rua, Buzzetti, Cagliero and several others began to keep chronicles of his sayings and doings. Preserved in the Salesian archives, these are invaluable resources for studying his life. Later on, the Salesian Don Lemoyne collected and combined them into 45 scrapbooks with oral testimonies and Don Bosco’s own Memoirs of the Oratory. His aim was to write a detailed biography. This project eventually became a nineteen-volume affair, carried out by him and two other authors. These are the Biographical Memoirs. It is clearly not the work of professional historians, but a somewhat uneven compilation of those chronicles that preserve the memories of teenage boys and young men under the spell of a remarkable and beloved father figure.
Death and canonization
Don Bosco died on January 31, 1888. His funeral was attended by thousands, and very soon after there were popular demands to have him canonized. Accordingly, the Archdiocese of Turin began to investigate and witnesses were called to determine if his holiness were worthy of a declared Saint. As expected, the Salesians, Daughters and Cooperators gave fulsome testimonies. But many remembered Don Bosco’s controversies in the 1870s with Archbishop Gastaldi, and some others high in the Church hierarchy thought him a loose cannon and a wheeler-dealer. In the canonization process, testimony was heard about how he went around Gastaldi to get some of his men ordained, and about their lack of academic preparation and ecclesiastical decorum. Political cartoons from the 1860s and later showing him shaking money from the pockets of old ladies, or going off to America for the same purpose, and were not forgotten. These opponents, including some cardinals, were in position to block his canonization and many Salesians feared around 1925 that they would succeed.
Pope Pius XI had known Don Bosco, and pushed the cause forward. Bosco was declared Blessed in 1929, and a Saint on Easter Sunday of 1934 and was given the title of "Father and Teacher of Youth".
Study resources
Sources
- Bosco, Giovanni (1989). Memoirs of the Oratory. Don Bosco Publications.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|city=ignored (|location=suggested) (help) - Amadei, Angelo. Biographical Memoirs of St. John Bosco. Don Bosco Publications.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|city=ignored (|location=suggested) (help); Unknown parameter|coauthors=ignored (|author=suggested) (help); Unknown parameter|years=ignored (help). These volumes translate id. Memorie Biografiche di San Giovanni Bosco, 19 vol. SEI.{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|city=ignored (|location=suggested) (help); Unknown parameter|years=ignored (help)
Studies
- Desramaut, François (1996). Don Bosco et son Temps. SEI.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|city=ignored (|location=suggested) (help) - Stella, Pietro (1996). Don Bosco: Religious Outlook and Spirituality. Translated by John Drury. Salesiana Publishers.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|city=ignored (|location=suggested) (help) - Wirth, Morand (1982). Don Bosco and the Salesians. New Rochelle, New Jersey. Don Bosco Publications. Translation of id. (1969). Don Bosco e i Salesiani: Centocinquant'anni di storia. SEI.
{{cite book}}: Unknown parameter|city=ignored (|location=suggested) (help)
See also
External links
- Salesians of Don Bosco website (multi-lingual website)
- Salesians of the UK
- UK Salesian (alumnus) website