Saint John Bosco, Priest

John Bosco was born in 1815 into a poor farming family at Becchi in Piedmont; his father died when he was two. As a boy he entertained other children with juggling and acrobatics and then repeated the Sunday sermon to them. Ordained a priest in 1841, he settled in Turin, then growing fast with factories, and gathered the boys of the streets into his “oratory,” where they found a home, schooling and trades.

To continue the work he founded the Salesians, named after Francis de Sales, in 1859, and in 1872, with Mary Mazzarello, the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians. His Memoirs tell of a dream at the age of nine that, he believed, showed him his life’s work. He died in Turin on 31 January 1888 and was canonized in 1934.