“History is too important to be left in the hands of just the historians,” I wrote in ANS in February 1983. The last General Chapter (2008) recognised this when it entitled its first key issue “Starting afresh from Don Bosco”. Now the Rector Major takes this up again strongly as he asks that the first year of the three year period of preparation for the bicentenary of the birth of Don Bosco (2011-2012) should concentrate on the knowledge of his life story (while the other two are respectively about his pedagogy (2012-2013) and his spirituality (2013-014).

However, the problem is: which Don Bosco? given that there are dozens of images of Don Bosco in books, magazines, news-papers, videocassettes, films, fiction. In his presentation of the Strenna for 2012 the Rector Major has made his choice: “The Don Bosco of history and in the history of his times,” since “Our approach to Don Bosco, done with appropriate methods of historical research, has led us to better understand and assess his human and Christian greatness, his practical brilliance, his skills as an educator, his spirituality, his work, fully understood only if deeply rooted in the history of the society in which he lived.” In my judgement at this point Salesians have to take three particular steps forward.

Above all they have to go once again to the genuine, sure sources, that is to the authentic texts of Don Bosco, to his writings, published by him or by his sons, on line or on the page. There is an embarrassment or riches thanks also to the work of the Salesian Historical Institute: the most important Pedagogical-spiritual Writings of Don Bosco are available in critical editions, and the same can be said for the Constitutions which he had approved for the Salesians and the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, for the Introduction to them, for the historical accounts of the Salesian Society, for the situation regarding  discipline at Valdocco in the seventies and eighties, for over half of his Correspondence, and the same applies to other  critical texts published in “Ricerche Storiche Salesiane”. On the internet now all the “Published Works” can be found as they appeared in his day in facsimile edition. The Rector Major, who in the Strenna for 2012 invites us to read and study the Memoirs of the Oratory (MO), certainly intends to address the whole Salesian Family and in particular young people and those who are intending to approach Don Bosco for the first time; certainly not the Salesians, Daughters of Mary Help of Christians who in their own time ought to have already been fascinated by that text, more story-telling than history, more pedagogical-spiritual than autobiographical (just like those watching modern day television programmes which make ample use of it.) Too often it is forgotten that the marvellous story of Don Bosco’s childhood, of his youth, of his first apostolic experiences at Valdocco are not the whole of Don Bosco, on the contrary; even more so since Fr Chávez invites us “to come  to know him as an educator and pastor, founder, guide, legislator.” Therefore heaven help us if we forget topics not found in the  MO: the real not the ideal Don Bosco of Valdocco, the building of the church of Mary Help of Christians and the “Marian phenomenon” which followed it, the planning and the founding of the Salesian Society, of the Institute of the FMA, of the Association of the Cooperators, of boarding and day schools and the expansion of Salesian work, the fulfilment of the missionary dream (not even mentioned in the Constitutions approved a few months earlier), the series of publications  of an educative-religious and scholastic-cultural nature; and again the Don Bosco who goes way beyond the “politics of the Pater Noster” in Italy, in Argentina, his relationships with Popes, the Holy See, the Bishops, the idea and the publication of the Salesian Bulletin, the formation of co-workers, the quest for financial resources, vocations… An impressive dynamism is the characteristic of Salesian work which Don Bosco was constantly “updating”.

But there is a second important step to take: that of going further than the sources  – even the most certain and sound – in the sense of going beyond the superficial reading they present at first sight. In the case of Don Bosco it is necessary to know  his ideas and ways of thinking, his own personal or acquired values, his written and spoken language, his way of acting and reacting … The theological interpretation of the sources needs to be complemented with the social, economical, political. The supernatural needs to “take into account” natural element and factors. Don Bosco is not an "island" in the sea of his times. We are helped in this by the studies of the historians, who, thank God,  have not been lacking in the last forty years, each one naturally with his own particular approach to the use of the sources. I limit myself to indicating just two books, those of Pietro Braido (Don Bosco prete dei giovani nel secolo delle libertà, Roma, LAS 20093) already translated into several languages, which bring together the best of the earlier studies, look into all the aspects of the historical events and of the personality of Don Bosco, offering ample quotations from his important writings. Each of the many chapters lends itself to further study thanks to the very rich and uptodate bibliography which has not lost sight of the warning given by Pope Leo XIII: “Veritas non indiget mendaciis nostris”, and also: “Primam esse historiae legem, ne quid falsi dicere audeat, deinde ne quid veri non audeat”.

The third step is that of reading the topics dealt with by Don Bosco the historian, of all kinds (religious, moral, dogmatic, political, cultural, economic...) in reference to the analogous recent problems and incidents, where they can be useful for our own days. The Rector Major in the Strenna offers a careful reflection: “The image of Don Bosco and his activity should be seriously reconstructed, beginning from our cultural horizons: the complexity of life today, globalisation and the difficulties of the apostolate, the decline in vocations, the “questioning” of consecrated life.”

The charism, to use a multi-purpose expression, needs to be “reinterpreted” so that it does  not remain a “precious fossil”. The “questions raised” by the Salesian community, by the church community,  by the socio-cultural context cannot be considered something “extraneous” to the life story of Don Bosco. In this regard one can understand that it is not just a matter of studying the founder, but also his “sons,” in other words the tradition. Indeed it could be said that it is precisely the tradition which helps to identify and to re-present in the language of today a “nucleus” of constant values within the “historical” concepts always contingent upon the socio-cultural circumstances which created them. Knowing how our past made its own the inspirations of Don Bosco, how it assumed his motives and the choices he made, how it responded to the needs of youth it its time, helps us to enter into the so-called “hermeneutic circle.” Therefore Salesian local historical records, the history of the Provinces, of the houses, of individual confreres, of their educational work have their own weight. For Latin America the Salesian Historical Institute has published a variety of important sources, such as the correspondence of  Fr Bodrato, Fr Tomaris, Fr Lasagna, the Visitation Reports of  Fr Albera to the Americas at the beginning of the XX century, other texts relating to the Salesian missions …

When he has understood, indicated and  explained the context, the events, the causes and the consequences, the historian has completed his task. To his “historical” interpretation there needs to be added the “existential,” for example one that deals with the five points of reference and practical commitments suggested by the Rector Major in next year’s Strenna. This is the task of everyone, that is to say the theologians, spiritual writers, educationalists, experts in the humanities, historians, General Chapters, the Rector Major, individual confreres, children of God… No one is excluded: Salesians, Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, Cooperators, Past Pupils, groups and members of the Salesian Family. And that applies to studies, reflections and choices not only for this first year, but for the whole three year period of preparation for the event in 2015.

Francesco Motto

Published 12/8/2011