VN at the Movies: Saint John Bosco: Mission to Love
Many of you use Netflix or some other video company to watch movies. Awhile back, I ordered a movie on St. Teresa of Avila that Spanish TV made on her. It turned out to be fantastic. It really brought her to life. So I decided to order more movies on the Saints.
I knew very little of St. John Bosco so I ordered the movie. It is 3 1/2 hours long and worth every minute. What an incredible human being. The movie is Saint John Bosco: Mission to Love. I can only strongly encourage everyone to watch it and get to know this incredible man and the other saints who worked with him.
The issues Bosco fought against then in Italy are the same issues we are dealing with now: capital punishment, juvenile detention, the role of the prison system: is it supposed to be restorative or should it merely protect society, sweatshops, freedom, revolution, the role of the Church in secular society. Bosco is the founder of the Salesians in honor of St. Frances de Sales.
Two lessons stand out to me: First, Bosco shows that when we try and make changes within society, it is NOT about social work. If we merely try and fix the material circumstances, hearts will rarely change. What Bosco immediately knew is that broken people are in need of LOVE. His criminal kids changed their lives because they felt valued and loved by Bosco. They wanted to become what he saw in them.
The other lesson is that Bosco was not the only saint in this movie. Actually, he is surrounded by saints, from the priest who first takes him in and inspires him to become a priest, to his mother(who needs to be canonized), to many of the boys who change their lives. There is one little boy, yes, little, who just stands out as truly holy. I asked my husband, “why haven’t we heard of this child?” At the end of the movie, we learn that he is a Saint. His name is St. Dominic Savio. He was only 15 when he died. My husband and I decided we want to name our next child (if we can ever have one) after him.
Saints are our heros. They suffer unjustly, they fight to make change, they persevere in prayer and Faith, they suffer from physical illnesses. And Bosco, Savio, and the other yet unnamed Saints are well worth getting to know.
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“If we merely try and fix the material circumstances, hearts will rarely change.”
A very good point that seems lost on many.
It is perhaps this very reason why the Son of God did not come in the manner of an actual political messiah (which was prominently expected by most, if not, all the Jews) to meet the material and physical needs of His people, but rather attended first and foremost to their spiritual needs and, above all, their salvation instead.
Miracles He did perform to heal the physical disorders of some people but these healings were nothing in comparison (no doubt, even after their being healed, these would still continue to suffer human ailments natural to our mortal nature and, finally, expire in the end) to the act of Redemption He would ultimately win on behalf of all people, Jews & Gentiles alike.
Good movie review.
Hopefully, there will be others like it especially concerning those of this genre.
This is a great movie! Thanks for encouraging others to see it. We bought it from Ignatius Press – well worth the money!
Hi!
I liked your review very much. And I am enchanted by the fact that you loved the movie (which means of course the person of Don Bosco) very much. I myself am a “Son of Don Bosco” – a Salesian Priest (the Order founded by Don Bosco)and work in India. You have really caught the essence of the person of Don Bosco. I too have seen the movie and liked it absolutely. We hope that Mamma Margaret, the Mother of Don Bosco too will be canonized very soon.
And I do pray that you will be blessed with a child whom you can name “Savio”!
God bless you and your family!
- Fr. Antony
Wow, Fr. Anthony. Thank you for stopping by and commenting. My husband and I would love your prayers. And I will pray that Mamma Margaret receives the Saint title she earned on earth. I will also say a prayer for the Salesian Order.
Don Bosco is a real fevorite of mine. He saw these boys — really no different from street kids today, think of the ones in Rio, for example — whom no one loved.
And yes, he helped their material circumstances, but more importantly he loved them. And the boys, starved for the love of a man, a father, loved him right back.
It’s a magnficent story and one that challenges. What man will dare play the part of Don Bosco today? Knowing the suspicion, the ugly taint of sexual scandal that will poison everything?
Let us pray God to give us courage to imitate him.
Don Bosco is my middle son’s patron saint, and bore a remarkable life… However, the acting in this movie was greatly lacking in many parts… Overall, I still enjoyed it because of the story.
Saint John Bosco is my patron saint, I have been researching to know about him and would need more information wherever I could find it. Greetings from Uganda.