1364 Third volume of Cimatti letters published in Japanese
austraLasia 1364
Third volume of letters of Don Cimatti published - in
Japanese
TOKYO: 22nd December 2005 -- It is a known fact that there
are more letters of Don Cimatti's preserved than there have been of Don
Bosco. Some 4,000 of Don Bosco's letters are in the archives. The
most recent inventory of letters belonging to Don Cimatti (listed in
summer 2005) runs to just over 6,000. A good number of the
originals or copies of same have been kept and catologued in the Cimati
Museum, at Chofu, Tokyo. At the UPS, Rome, under the direction of
Fr Semeraro, the grand effort is well underway to transfer all of these
to digital form for publication.
Meanwhile, the curator of the Cimatti Museum and
vice postulator for the Cause, Fr Gaetano Compri, has been translating
these letters into Japanese. Fr Compri has been 50 years a
missionary in Japan, seven of which were lived under the direction of
Don Cimatti himself. Yesterday, volume three of the translated
letters was published, all 34o pages it. Don Cimatti's written
style, at times flowery, but frank and full of sentiment, is not so
easy to render in a language like Japanese, and yet those who have read
it have said that it expresses the warmth and heart of a saintly
person. Volume One contains letters from 1926, the year Don
Cimatti devoted to study of the Japanese language and his first
encounter with Japan. Volume Two contains letters from 1927 to
the early months of 1929 when Don Cimatti was parish priest in
Miyazaki. Now Volume Three takes up from 1929 to 1931, which
includes Cimatti's visit to Italy for the Beatification of Don Bosco,
and for the General Chapter, then his return with the first group of
clerics and with the first group of Salesian Sisters, as well as his
formation activity during the time of the Great Depression.
Clearly, then, an abundant selection of letters has
been translated. It would not be possible nor opportune to
translate them all.
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