Saint John Bosco (16 August 1815 – 31 January 1888), born Giovanni Melchiorre Bosco, also called Don Bosco, was an Italian Catholic priest and educator, who put into practice the convictions of his religion, dedicating his life to the upliftment and education of poor youngsters, and employing teaching methods based on love rather than punishment. He placed his works under the protection of Francis de Sales; the chief organization he founded was therefore known as the Society of St Francis de Sales, or, popularly, as the Salesian Society or the Salesians of Don Bosco.

Don Bosco was of the opinion that young people make mistakes not out of malice but due to lack of guidance and thoughtlessness. If punishments are inflicted harshly they do not forget them easily and seek to take revenge. Therefore, if possible, it is better not to have recourse to punishments. But if punishment becomes inevitable they should be done privately, with love, prudence and patience. However, certain punishments like striking someone, pulling someone’s ears, making someone kneel and other such punishments are to be avoided absolutely.

Don Bosco held that humans are created in the image and likeness of God. Because of this among all material beings humans alone intelligence and will and thus the capacity to love one another and to relate to God. Therefore they have a dignity and worth which other material things do not have. This is to be manifested in the way we deal with the young: “Let us treat young people as we would treat Jesus if he were a pupil in one of our schools.

Don Bosco said that his educational system, “places the pupils in the impossibility of committing faults.” Prevention has two functions: positively, it offers support to the young person to grow by offering a healthy atmosphere; defensively, it protects the young from falling into situations of risk. “Preventive activity to be educational must include: foreseeing the youngster’s psychological moment; allowing calculated and responsible risks; and trust in youthful idealism and sense of responsibility.” When practiced in this way prevention will offer the young person adequate opportunity to make free decisions while at the same time protecting them from damaging experiences, which especially at their age of psychological development, can become insurmountable obstacles for their growth.

Assistance has two meanings in the writings of Don Bosco: meeting all the real needs of young people like food, clothing, shelter and lodging, a job, education, good use of free time; and educator’s vigilance and ‘presence’ to the young. So assistance is ‘presence’ and ‘availability’ of the educator to the young person “for everything that was needed, in any particular educational situation. Obviously this includes ‘supervision’ when needed, especially in a boarding school setting.” Don Bosco placed great emphasis on the presence of the educator with the pupils especially during recreation.

One of the secrets of the good running of the oratory mentioned by Don Bosco was: “happiness, singing, music and great freedom in amusements.” Don Caviglia, an authority on Don Bosco says, “Don Bosco was able to see the part of joy in formation and in the life of sanctity, and wanted that gaiety and good humour should reign among his people. Servite Domino in laetitia (Serve the Lord in

Don Bosco maintained that “it is not possible to educate youngsters if they have no trust in their superiors.” Only if the pupils trust the educator will they open themselves to him/her. Trust is gained by eliminating whatever alienates the pupils from the educator. The educator can do this by going to the pupils first, adapting to their tastes and becoming one like them.

“Familiarity for Don Bosco meant family-style relationships and a home-like way of living and working together. Its result is the family spirit.” Don Bosco, except in official documents, preferred to refer to his institutions as house, this house, the house of the oratory, etc. He wanted his institutions to be like a home and the people living and working/studying there to relate to one another as members of a family: “Every youngster who comes to a house of ours should regard his companions as brothers, and his superiors as those who take the place of his parents.” To speak of the educator-pupil relationship in terms of father-son relationship was quite common.

Don Bosco used to adivse the directors of Salesian institutions: “Try to make yourself loved rather than feared” The love that he had in mind was a spiritually mature, impartial, generous, selfless and self-sacrificing love. In the Letter from Rome (1884) he mentions love 27 times (The letter has 3,693 words). The youngsters must be made to feel that they are loved. He says: “The youngsters should not only be

Don Bosco based his educational method on the Catholic faith tradition and believed that faith in Jesus Christ and commitment to the Church were needed not only for spiritual growth but also for one’s human, psychological, and intellectual growth. He also placed lot of importance on religious practices. However, once (February 1878) he explained his educational method to Minister of the Interior Francesco Crispi, without making any reference to religion.

By reason Don Bosco meant at least four things: Arthur Lenti, a specialist on Don Bosco says that “reason may be defined as justice, in the sense that the educator, as well as the youngster, is subject to the rule… rights and obligations must be constantly respected and lived up to by everybody;” Reasonableness, that is everything that is asked of the young must be proportionate to their age and possible for them, especially with regard to work assignment and discipline; Rationality, that is the reason for the decisions and demands as well as the good that is expected to result from them must be made evident to the young; and Motivation, that is motivation should be created in the young to follow the educational programme that is proposed to them and their cooperation and participation in it must be elicited.

The Preventive System can be said to be the sum total of the convictions of Don Bosco, based on his long experience of nearly fifty years of working with the young at risk, which found expression in a specific style of relating, that he used for dealing constructively and effectively with youth to make them God-oriented persons and responsible citizens. Although at the request of different people he wrote short texts explaining his system at various times, the tenets of the system are contained in his 47 year experience of working with young at risk rather than in any one text.

Abbé Pierre (1912-2007), was a French Catholic Priest who founded the Emmaus Movement in 1949 to help poor and homeless people and refugees. For almost twenty consecutive years he was voted the most popular person in France. He has come to India at the invitation of Indira Gandhi and Jayaprakash Narayan to deal with the issues of refugees. Fr. Duvallet was for twenty years a collaborator of Abbé Pierre in the work of re-education of delinquent youth.

The Salesian Society is a worldwide organization founded by St. John Bosco and is the third largest Catholic religious order in the world. Don Bosco gathered a number of priests and lay people together to found a religious congregation in the Catholic Church. He called this congregation the Salesian Society.It was named after St. Francis de Sales who was known for his kind and gentle manner, a trait which Don Bosco wanted his Salesians to acquire.

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