The magisterium of life

On receiving the news of Father Albera’s death, Father Joseph Vespignani commented from Argentina: “We believe that the late rector major was the continuation of the life, spirit, and activity of Don Bosco and Father Rua; and that all three of them formed a splendid triad, enormously prov-idential and commendable in our Congregation.”¹ It is true. We can say that without the dedication and charisma of these disciples, collaborators, and successors of Don Bosco, after the death of the Founder, the Salesian Society probably would quickly have spent its charismatic identity.

Don Bosco chose Father Rua as vicar specifically to structure the nascent Salesian Society, to organise it, to guarantee its organic devel-opment and disciplinary solidarity. Subsequently, in naming Father Albera as spiritual director of the Congregation, Father Rua entrusted to him the consolidation of the confreres’ spiritual life: to instil in them the “spirit”

inherited from the Founder and to guarantee a linear path of formation for the younger generations. Like subsequent rectors major, Rua and Albera showed a keen responsibility to maintain and develop the spiritual and pedagogical patrimony of Don Bosco. They committed themselves in word and action, but above all in the witness of their lives.

Father Albera was aware of the mission he had received. He agonized about it because he felt he was not up to the task. His personal diaries attest to his constant spiritual tension, his relentless asceticism aimed at nurturing the fire of charity that Don Bosco had kindled in his heart starting in his adolescence, and at achieving the competence and holiness required of his governance. The intimacy of his life and work alongside the Founder had convinced him that the best way to maintain his spirit over time and assim-ilate his charism was to imitate in himself Don Bosco’s virtues, zeal, and holiness. The Founder was his constant point of reference. Throughout his life, he tried to model himself on the teachings, example, and actions of the Congregation’s Father, and to help the Salesians do the same.

In the circular letter he sent when the monument to Don Bosco was dedicated, Albera recalls his youthful years lived alongside the Founder,

“breathing almost his very soul.” He recalls the time he spent in Valdocco after his ordination, thus having been able to “enjoy his intimacy and draw from his great heart those precious teachings.” He writes:

During those years mainly, and even later, on those occasions, always desired, when I had to be with him or accompany him on his travels, I persuaded myself that the only thing necessary to become his worthy son was to imitate him in everything. Therefore, following the example of numerous elder brothers who had already copied in themselves the way of thinking, speaking, and acting of their Father, I tried to do the same.

And today, after more than half a century, I repeat also to you that you are sons like me, and that he has entrusted you to me, as the eldest son. Let us imitate Don Bosco in acquiring our religious perfection, educating and sanctifying youth, dealing with others, and doing good to all.²

He insisted that his confreres get to know the Founder, study his life and writings with love, and speak often of him to young people and the Cooperators. He also had a profound veneration for Father Rua, especially regarding his concern for perfection even in little things. He wanted the Salesians to regard Father Rua as having been entirely united to Don Bosco.

“Why was Don Bosco loved so much? Why were all hearts united with him?” he asked the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians during their Seventh General Chapter. “It was because he was blessed to have a Father Rua at his side, who handled all the unpleasant tasks. … When he was elected rector major, some were afraid of a rigorous government. Instead, we saw how good his heart was. This will remain one of the most beautiful pages of Father Rua’s life, and you will see how much he contributed to the halo around Don Bosco.”³

According to Father Louis Terrone, “the key idea that people had of Father Albera was that he was an authentic man of God, an exemplary priest, a totally interior soul.” This spiritual dimension was clear in him:

his demeanour, his gaze, and his way of speaking and preaching revealed the religious constantly concerned about the things of heaven.⁴ He had the gift of great natural goodness, which he perfected by working on himself to the point of becoming a man of impressive, exquisite courtesy. He constantly insisted on the importance that Don Bosco attributed to kindness and propriety in dealing with others, without distinction of condition and

2 LC 331.

3 Garneri 437-438.

4 Garneri 485.

temperament. He quoted Saint Francis de Sales to support the value and effectiveness of good manners as an expression of Christian charity, since they “serve admirably to avoid friction, smooth out the rough edges of one’s character, and preserve peace, mutual understanding, and a certain interior cheerfulness and good domestic relationships.”⁵ He was the first to give an example with his friendliness, which won over young people and adults.

The confreres who lived with him testify to the wealth of his virtues:

he was prudent in words and decisions, humble and patient. He showed a constant spirit of self-denial. Despite his frail health, he never shied away from his duties and remained extremely temperate in everything.⁶ His intimate notes reveal his efforts to correct and perfect his own humanity and to nourish his interior life. He also had an exceptional ability to listen, an empathy that attracted confidence.

Through his practical experience in hearing confessions and giving spiritual direction, he had become an expert on the human heart. But he felt a constant need to deepen his knowledge of the spiritual life through the study of and meditation on spiritual authors. As Father Francis Scaloni testifies, the French and Belgian confreres were convinced that he had read “every ascetical work of any value,” and that he knew how to make a thoughtful judgement in spiritual matters. He did not read superficially; he accompanied his reading with meditation “to nourish his mind and heart.”⁷ From these readings and reflections, he drew material for the ministry of preaching and spiritual accompaniment. Father John Baptist Grosso, his close collaborator during his years in Marseille, says that “amid the various concerns of being provincial and director of Saint Leo Oratory…, he found time to read a great deal, and almost only ascetical books. Eagerly and carefully, he procured every new book of asceticism that the best French authors published. Not only did he read and annotate them, but he made summaries or excerpts from them, which later helped him considerably in his monthly conferences to his confreres, and in those which he often gladly gave in the various houses.”⁸

5 Garneri 467.

6 Garneri 475-484.

7 Garneri 452-453. In Father Albera’s spiritual diary and in his preaching notes there are references to about eighty authors, according to Joseph Boenzi, “Reconstructing Father Albera’s Reading List,” in Ricerche Storiche Salesiane 33 (2014) 203-272.

This taste for the spiritual life, this desire to understand it in depth, must be connected with his personal admiration for Don Bosco’s holiness and profound piety. Since boyhood, he had tried to imitate in himself the saint’s spirit of prayer and constant union with God. Over the years, he too assimilated the gift of prayer and contemplation. He imposed nothing, but his sincere piety impressed those who saw him praying or celebrating the Eucharist. Fully immersed in adoration, he assumed an attitude of great kindness, a concentration so intense as to move observers. “He made a special commitment to do meditation and thanksgiving after Mass and often recommended the practice of the examination of conscience.”⁹ His piety was tender, affective, and intensely communicative, sustained espe-cially with meditation on the Gospel and the letters of Saint Paul.¹⁰

His predominant tendency to divine intimacy and taste for piety did not diminish; rather, they constantly nourished his spirit of initiative, pastoral service, and fervour in his work. He was convinced that authentic piety generates apostolic zeal, illuminates educational activity, inspires it and makes it fruitful, as was the case with Don Bosco.

In his dynamic concern to follow the examples of the Founder and of Father Rua, to “preserve in our Congregation the spirit and traditions we have learned from them,” he wrote in his first circular letter, presenting the commitment he had assumed at his election, Albera felt the need to stress some themes that he considered basic, together with others related to his sensitivity or required by historical contingencies, by the context in which his readers worked, and by his intimate knowledge of the confreres.

His weighty circular letters are of an exhortative, sapiential, not doctrinal or systematic character, but they reveal a thorough familiarity with the theology of consecrated life and Christian spirituality. In them, some recurring thematic nuclei emerge, which we intend to highlight.