“Father and Teacher of Youth”: this is how John Paul II described Don Bosco because of his educational method, based on three pillars: religion, reason, and loving-kindness, and aimed at forming good Christians and honest citizens. Don Bosco, one of the saints most loved during his lifetime, is still one of the most invoked and popular saints today because of the graces continually obtained through his intercession.
Childhood
John Bosco was born on August 16, 1815, at Becchi, a hamlet of Castelnuovo d’Asti (today Castelnuovo Don Bosco); his father, Francesco Bosco, and his mother, Margherita Occhiena, were farmers. At just 2 years old, John was orphaned of his father, and his mother, widowed at 29, found herself with three children to raise: besides John, there were Antonio (the son of her deceased first husband) and Giuseppe; Margherita also had to care for and support her elderly and sick mother-in-law. And she rolled up her sleeves; she worked the fields and, with great sacrifice, struggled to provide the family with what they needed and to allow John to study. This was also frowned upon by his half-brother Antonio, who considered the time and money spent on books wasted while he had to hoe the land.
John was intelligent and brilliant, and in the village he had become the idol of the boys; he was a natural leader. On Sundays, after Vespers, he gathered his peers and entertained them with games and acrobatics he had seen performed by street entertainers at fairs; then, gifted with an exceptional memory, he repeated for them the sermon he had heard in church.
The Dream at Age 9
At the age of 9, he had a dream that revealed the mission to which God was calling him; he later described it as a prophetic dream. He told his boys several times about what, according to his first biographer Lemoyne, we might call a vision. In the dream, he seemed to be near his home, in a large courtyard, where he was amusing himself with a great number of boys. Some were laughing, others were playing, and quite a few were blaspheming. Hearing the blasphemies, he rushed among them, trying to stop them with his fists and words. At that moment, a majestic man appeared to him, nobly dressed: his face was so luminous that John could not look at him. The man called John by name and ordered him to place himself at the head of those boys, adding: “You must make them your friends not with blows but with gentleness and charity. Come, speak to them; explain that sin is a bad thing and that friendship with the Lord is a precious good.” When the Saint asked him who he was, he replied: “I am the son of the woman whom your mother taught you to greet three times a day.” At that moment, he saw a majestic woman beside him, dressed in a radiant mantle. She took him by the hand and indicated that he should look in one direction; when John looked there, he realized that all those boys had disappeared and that in their place was a multitude of little goats, dogs, cats, bears, and several other animals. The majestic woman said to him: “Here is your field, here is where you must work. Grow humble, strong, and robust, and what you now see happening to these animals, you must do for my children.” Looking again, he saw that the ferocious animals had been replaced by just as many gentle lambs, which skipped, ran, bleated, and celebrated around that man and woman. At this point in the dream, John began to cry and told the woman that he did not understand all these things; the Virgin then placed a hand on his head and said to him: “In due time, you will understand everything.”
Adolescence and Youth
After his First Communion, which he received at the age of 11, the bullying by his half-brother became unbearable, and he had to leave home; he worked as a farmhand at the Moglia farmstead. There, in November 1829, he met Father Giovanni Calosso, chaplain of Morialdo; after realizing the boy’s intelligence, the priest undertook to help him with his studies and gave him his first lessons in Latin. When the priest died suddenly, John was able to resume his studies only in 1831. He did all kinds of work to pay for school: carpenter, tailor, waiter, shoemaker, and apprentice blacksmith. At the school in Chieri, he founded the “Society of Joy,” through which, together with some young people, he sought to bring his peers closer to prayer by using magic tricks and his acrobatics. During those years, he became great friends with Luigi Comollo, nephew of the parish priest of Cinzano. The young man was often mistreated and insulted by his classmates, but he did not react violently; rather, his weapon was a smile. Young Bosco defended him, even getting into fights with his attackers; for his part, Comollo accepted this suffering and never withheld words of forgiveness. In his Memoirs, Don Bosco declared: “I can say that from him I began to learn how to live as a Christian,” and he understood how essential the salvation of the soul was.
His mother played a fundamental role in John’s life; unlike his relatives, she never obstructed his vocation.
From the First Signs of His Vocation to Entering the Seminary
Following the so-called “dream at age 9,” John had already begun to sense his vocation. At the age of 19, he wanted to become a Franciscan religious, and his mother, who had been informed by the parish priest of her son’s intention, said to him: “The parish priest came to tell me that you want to enter a convent. Listen carefully. I want you to think it over calmly. When you have decided, follow your path without looking anyone in the face. The most important thing is that you do the Lord’s will. The parish priest would like me to change your mind, because in the future I might need you. But I tell you: your mother has nothing to do with these matters. God comes first. I want nothing from you and expect nothing from you. I was born poor, I have lived poor, and I want to die poor. Indeed, I want to tell you this right away: if you became a priest and, unfortunately, became rich, I would never set foot in your house again. Remember that well.” John never forgot his mother’s words. She always remained at his side, advising and helping him later in his educational work.
After much prayer and consultation with his confessor, Father Giuseppe Cafasso, and his friends, at the age of 20, on October 25, 1835, John entered the seminary in Chieri; he remained there for six years.
“Give Me Souls, Take Away the Rest”
At the seminary, John met his friend Comollo again, but in 1837, at just 22 years old, Comollo died. From the direct testimony of John Bosco and his roommates, we know that his friend appeared to the Saint like a roll of thunder and in the form of a light; he said to him: “Bosco! Bosco! Bosco! I am saved!” From that moment onward, John, deeply shaken, decided to place eternal salvation above everything else, so much so that his motto, inspired by Gen 14:21, was: “Da mihi animas, caetera tolle” (“Give me souls, take away the rest”); this phrase was written in large letters on a sign he kept in his room at Valdocco.
Priest Among the Young
He was ordained a priest on June 5, 1841. At Father Cafasso’s invitation, he decided to enter the Ecclesiastical Boarding School of St. Francis of Assisi in Turin to deepen his knowledge of moral theology and prepare for ministry. He remained there for three years. It was precisely during that period that he began the mission he had desired to fulfill since childhood: to be a priest among the young, to make Catholic doctrine known to them, to teach them to love Jesus and Mary Most Holy, and to show them the path to the salvation of the soul. It all began after the Saint met the young bricklayer Bartolomeo Garelli, who had been mistreated by the sacristan because he did not know how to serve Mass. Don Bosco had him say a Hail Mary and invited him to return with his friends. The Oratory of St. Francis de Sales was born with Garelli, and after a few days, six boys arrived with him, later joined by others sent by Father Cafasso. The Oratory’s work, initially itinerant, later found a permanent home at Valdocco, the Mother House of all Salesian works. Don Bosco recognized the social and spiritual hardship of the adolescents of his time. Turin was then a city expanding on several fronts; there was strong immigration from the Piedmontese countryside, and young people were afflicted by various problems: unemployment, illiteracy, moral degradation, and a lack of religious assistance. The transition from the agricultural world to the pre-industrial one had produced difficulties that traditional pastoral care had been unable to address. Don Bosco, together with other young priests, understood that the Oratory could be the answer to this critical situation.
“Good Christians and Honest Citizens”
Don Bosco wanted to form “good Christians and honest citizens.” He pointed out that it was not enough to love young people; they had to perceive that they were loved. “It is more convenient for our impatience - he wrote - and our pride to punish those who resist than to correct them by bearing with them firmly and kindly. The charity I recommend to you is the charity that St. Paul showed toward the faithful newly converted to the religion of the Lord, and which often made him weep and plead when he saw them less docile and responsive to his zeal. It is difficult, when punishing, to preserve the calm necessary to dispel any doubt that one is acting to make one’s authority felt or to vent one’s passion. Let us regard as our children those over whom we have some power. Let us place ourselves almost at their service, like Jesus, who came to obey and not to command, being ashamed of anything in us that might appear domineering; and let us exercise authority over them only in order to serve them with greater pleasure. This is how Jesus treated his apostles, bearing with their ignorance and roughness, their lack of faithfulness, and treating sinners with such familiarity and cordiality that it caused astonishment in some, almost scandal in others, and in many the holy hope of obtaining forgiveness from God.”
The “Dream of the Two Pillars”
Don Bosco loved the Eucharist, the Madonna, and the Pope with all his heart. His famous “dream of the two pillars” is considered prophetic for the future of the Church. The Saint had dreamed of a violent battle at sea, launched by many vessels against one great ship symbolizing the Church, with the Pope as its commander. The ship, struck several times, was guided by the Pope to drop anchor between two tall columns rising from the sea: the column of the Eucharist and that of the Madonna.
A Life Dedicated to Young People Until the End
Don Bosco said to his young people: “I study for you, I work for you, I live for you, and I am even prepared to give my life for you.” A total love that, at the age of 72, despite being exhausted by his work, made him say: “I have promised God that my every last breath would be for my poor young people.”
He said to them: “You will find writers far more virtuous and learned than I, but you will rarely find anyone who loves you more than I do in Jesus Christ and who desires your true happiness more than I do.” One of his final recommendations was this: “Tell my boys that I am waiting for them all in Paradise.”
He died at dawn on January 31, 1888. He was beatified on June 2, 1929, and canonized on April 1, 1934, at the close of the Year of Redemption.
Saint John Bosco is the founder of the Salesians and the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians.
May the example of Saint John Bosco illuminate us like a lighthouse through our nights and our struggles to educate; may his example and words inspire us to live holy lives, so that we too may become credible witnesses for our young people.
Have a blessed journey!
