austraLasia #2380

Looking ahead (with a smile) to Don Rua 2010

ROME: 18th March 2009 --  While everyone is focused on the 150th anniversary of the Foundation of the Salesian Congregation, it is good to recall that it is one commemoration in a significant list of such leading up to 2015 and the bicentenary of Don Bosco's birth. As the Rector Major indicates in his closing remarks in the GC26 Chapter documents, 'we are in a state of return to Don Bosco'.  The 2010 commemoration of Don Rua's death, the man known as 'the living Rule', is another step along the way - and a step not far off.
    In view of this, we are doing our best to bring together some of the bits and pieces, be they of a scholarly kind (especially the work of the ISS, the Salesian Historical Institute), or just other items found along the way.
    The reader can of course go to the individual sites which hold this material - the ISS site, for example is available from the www.sdb.org home page.  But another simple approach is to go the the 'Rua' collection in SDL where we are trying to pull this material together.
    It is in this connection that we have happened upon an interesting photo!  The question 'did Don Rua smile?' now has an answer, and it is not trick photography!  The date was 21-06-1905 to be precise, and whereas almost any photo of the era was taken with great preparation and was inevitably posed, here we have an example of a snapshot, and it shows Don Rua at a moment of great mirth, surrounded by some  seminarians.
    The downside is that this item comes from a magazine, or appears to come from a  magazine, in Faenza, hence it is grainy. But - be amongst the first of our contemporaries to see it!  Just go to SDL (see below for the address) and select the Rua collection, then the 'titles' tab, or 'titolo' and Rua sorridente (3) is what you will want to see, the jpg version.
    For those who do not manage Italian, the caption says: Today 21st June 1905, Don Bosco's Successor, Don Michael Rua, took part in the Feast of St Aloysius at the seminary in Faenza, and seminarian Visani took a surprise snapshot. In the thousands of photos of Don Rua in groups or alone, this is the only one where we see him laughing. [Then the seminarians with him are named - which adds further authenticity to the photo, obviously].
    There is already a wealth of material available in Italian on Rua and more coming.  All his letters can be found on this site, and the collection of his circulars done by Fr Albera are also available, as also a study done by Francis Motto on Rua in the Bollettino Salesiano.
    There are two forthcoming items in English to add to the very meagre material we now have in English - other than Lappin's work, there seems little else. John Dixon from GBR province has been working on an historical study of Rua's letters to the province; this will be published, one imagines, under the auspices of the ISS.  But the other is a full-blown study of Rua, a 'Life of Michael Rua' by Fr Desramaut.  Now here is a serious appeal: we have the original text in French.  It is a substantial work - 306 A4 pages.  Any takers for an English translation?
  _________________
 AustraLasia is an email service for the Salesian Family of Asia Pacific.  It also functions as an agency for ANS based in Rome.  For queries please contact admin@bosconet.aust.com . Use Bosconet-wiki to be interactive. RSS feeds - just go to Bosconet, click on austraLasia 2009 in the sidebar. You will see the RSS orange icon in your browser address bar - add it from there.  Avail yourself of the Salesian Digital Library at http://sdl.sdb.org

Title: australasia 2380
Subject and key words:  SDB General: Rua
Date (year): 2009
ID: 2000-2099|2380