What People are Commenting
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Palliative Care & an Adulterated Dom Bosco
Boycott Palliative Care
Thank you so much for posting my comments.
It has been difficult to get the true message out about the true threats at end of life. I am working on exposing the Pontifical Academy for Life's "White Paper for Global Palliative Care Advocacy: Recommendations from a PAL-LIFE Expert Advisory Group of the Pontifical Academy for Life, Vatican City."
We have problems! Right here in our own religion.
The irony of this is that they met in December, 2019 just as the pandemic broke out so their message was muddled for months.
Now their message is at full throttle.
People need to attempt a boycott of palliative care to the best of their ability.
Elizabeth D. Wickham, Ph.D.
lifetree.org
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Was Dom Bosco a Trickster & Acrobatic Priest?
I have a devotion to St. John Bosco; however, I struggle to understand why it was acceptable for him to perform acrobatics tricks for children.
I have read many of your articles condemning dancing priests, singing nuns and other unserious Catholics, and I do not see how their actions were different from those of St. John Bosco.
Of course, I know that this great Saint took life seriously. Therefore, I am hoping you can explain the context behind his acrobatics performances and why they were permitted by the Church.
In Maria,
S.J.
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TIA responds:
Dear S. J.,
Let us suppose that it were true that St. John Bosco habitually performed magic tricks and acrobatics for children.
If this were normal in his life - we will show below that it was not - it would only reflect an exception to how the life of a priest should be.
As the saying goes, "The exception does not destroy the rule, but confirms it."
Some cases of exceptions include:
- St. Felix Cantalício, a Capuchin lay brother, who would habitually sing in the streets of Rome to ask donations for his monastery. If this exception were transformed into a rule and extended to other fields, we would have religious brothers and priests constantly serenading in the streets and the religious vocation would go astray;
- David danced before the Ark of the Covenant on one occasion (2 Kings 6:16). If all the authorities, especially the religious authorities, were to transform this exception into a general rule and dance before the Tabernacle, we would have religious ceremonies transformed into a constant Carnival.
- The Franciscans have a very radical vow of poverty. This vow was historically justified as an exception to balance the exaggerated attachment other Orders and the Clergy at that time
had to material goods and riches. If this exception were to be applied to the entire Church, we would have a Miserablist Church that would deny God the indispensable pomp and solemnity He deserves to be duly glorified among men.
Further, if the Franciscan poverty were to be transformed into a rule for all society, we would have a communist temporal order.
To take an exception as a rule is a sophism frequently employed by Progressivism.
So, the lesson we take from these precedents is that if St. John Bosco were doing magic tricks and acrobatics for his students all his life, it would be just one exception. It would not justify other priests to do the same.
Now then, although he did do sleight-of-hand tricks and acrobatics when he was a boy, after he became a priest he renounced these pastimes. If he were to do these things then, he would be breaking his resolve, which would be a fault – read below the seven decisions he made when he became a priest.
His mother Ven. Mama Margherita understood the dignity of the priesthood to which her son was being called. Before John entered the seminary and after donning the clerical garb of the seminarian, his mother took him aside and told him:
“My dear John, at long last you have been clothed with this sacred habit. Nothing could give me greater joy than to see you in your cassock... I ask of you one sacred thing, never forget what I request of you tonight. It is not the cassock or habit that makes a man a good religious. It is the constant, daily practice of virtue that makes a good priest. If for a single moment you were to doubt your vocation - then my son - by all that is most sacred, I plead with you to remove your habit, take it off, lay it aside... I never want for a son, a negligent priest." (Mamma Margherita: St. John Bosco’s Mother, Altadena: The Benziger Sisters Publishers, 1973)
These words he never forgot, and lest he become a “negligent priest,” he carefully avoided any act that could degrade his dignity as a priest, completely different from the dancing priests, acrobatic priests and other worldly religious of today.
John Bosco did perform acrobatic tricks for children and adults alike, but this was only as a boy, when he used the popularity of his performances to teach people about the Catholic Faith between acts. After he received Holy Orders, Dom Bosco made serious resolutions to change his life to suit the priestly state, which he records in his Memoires:
"From that day on [the day of his ordination], I had to give serious thought to myself. The life I had led so far had to change radically. In the past years I had not done anything bad, but I had been careless, vain, all absorbed in games, tricks, stunts and similar pastimes that gave momentary pleasure but did not really satisfy the heart. I determined to start a new life and lest I should forget, I wrote down the following resolutions:
- "In the future I shall no longer take part in fiestas or fairs. I shall never go to dances or to the theater; nor, as far as possible, will I attend any banquets on such occasions.
- I shall never again perform sleight-of-hand tricks, stunts or similar acts. I shall no longer play the violin, or go hunting, because I consider these things contrary to priestly decorum.
- I shall avoid worldliness; I shall be moderate in eating and drinking; I shall not sleep more than necessary for my health.
- Since in the past I have served the world with frivolous reading, from now on I shall try to serve God by reading religious works.
- I shall oppose with all my strength anything contrary to the virtue of chastity: books, thoughts, deeds or words. I shall practice, instead, whatever can, even in a small degree, help preserve this virtue.
- Beside the seminary practices of piety, I shall devote a little time each day to meditation and to spiritual reading.
- Every day I shall tell some example or some spiritual maxim to my companions, my friends, my relatives, or at least to my mother.
“I made these resolutions when I donned the cassock.” (Giovanni Battista Lemoyne. The Biographical Memoirs of Saint John Bosco. New York: Salesiana Publishers, Inc., 1965).
We hope this is of help to you.
Cordially,
TIA correspondence desk
Posted September 13, 2022
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The opinions expressed in this section - What People Are Commenting - do not necessarily express those of TIA
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I do a lot of reading from your website. I would be able to read more and longer if your website had a dark mode option. Only a suggestion.
Great content otherwise.
God bless you,
T.B.