Remembering Bro. Schmidt

For more than three decades, the students of Don Bosco Technical Institute in Victorias, Philippines, knew him as a coach and a friend on the football field. 

On any school day, just after having lunch, students would stand by his room at the dormitory waiting for him to come out with footballs🏀 in hand, and like the Pied Piper, he would lead them to the center of the football field where he would start a football match with a kickoff.  Whoever wanted to play was welcome, and he did not care if there were more than the regulated 22 players on the field. It was a free-for-all game because the intention was not to win, but to have fun🏆. And there were always students who stood as goalies, each one defending the goals at the dormitory side and the school gym side of the field.  Even under the noontime sun, amidst the heat of the tropics, he ran, sweated and yelled with the boys of Don Bosco in Victorias just like what the saint himself did in Turin more than a century before.

Bro. Charles Schmidt was our Trigonometry teacher 📘from Germany. He was stern, robust, and just like any German, had blue eyes. His favorite word in class was "hopeless" - to describe his students who couldn't answer his Trigonometry question (I included!).😂 Most of us probably didn't care about sine, cosine and tangent, much to his disappointment. He must have been very strict in the classroom because, for him, knowledge and education were first, football skills second.  He wanted us to learn more from him inside the classroom than in the football field.

A month ago, after years of being told about his death, I was finally pointed to his grave at the Saint Joseph Memorial garden in Victorias City. His grave was surrounded by tall weeds, his tombstone grayed and his headstone broken. He has been buried here for more than 33 years, and time and the elements have certainly done their part.  Solely occupying a large lot, he is kept company by a tree that welcomes any visitor with a shade. I saw no melted candles or wilted flowers on his grave.

Wanting to do something for Bro. Schmidt, I shared an idea with my batchmates and they generously responded, though the amount needed was not much.

And just weeks before the feast day of Saint John Bosco, Bro. Schmidt's grave was cleaned and painted, the weeds around it cleared, and his headstone repaired and his name reinked, and two candleholders were placed on it to allow any visitor with candles to light a flame for his eternal peace.  The two small benches next to his grave were also repainted so that anyone who wants to stay longer and say a prayer for him can do so in comfort.

We may have heard stories about his origins or about his drinking, but what I would want to remember about Bro. Schmidt, among the good things he had done for us, was how he made the sign of the cross. 

Had you seen him do it, you would have also admired the way he elevated the sanctity of this Catholic ritual: it was done slowly and silently with his right hand taking its time to touch his forehead, his chest and then his shoulders like it was indeed a profession of his faith. And at the end, you'd hear clearly the 'Amen' spoken in his husky voice.

His weekend hiking was legendary. Even under the hot sun, he trekked for kilometers around Victorias and Manapla, covering the distances of the national highway and the dirt roads of the haciendas to the north and south, and even meandering through the highlands of Gawahon while mingling with the locals he met along the way and always carrying a walking stick.

Whoever he was in the past should not matter to us. It was his dedication in helping realize Don Bosco's dream of teaching young minds and molding young characters through his teaching and his football here in Victorias that we, Bosconians, should remember and honor. He might not have been officially a member of the Salesians of Don Bosco, but to us, he was 'Brother Schmidt'. 

On his headstone is written:

  "RIP Karl

   Bro. Schmidt

   BORN:  Aug 22, 1912

   DIED:   July 26, 1990."

"As I light these candles, I pray that you rest in eternal peace."🙏

                                * * * * *

These are the photos of his grave on my first visit:

Bro. Schmidt's grave now looks like he is indeed remembered:

A short clip of the grave:

His grave is at the western end of St. Joseph Memorial Garden, second to the last plot before the closed gate and marked by a tree.🌲

#donbosco #sangiovannibosco #bosconian #salesians #famigliasalesiana #dbtivictorias #victorias #donboscophilippines

The Salesian Brotherhood and The Boys of Don Bosco

In 1825, when Saint John Bosco was just nine years old, he had a dream. 

In his dream, a man clothed in white and whose face was illuminated with blinding light told him to help the young with gentleness and love, and that this man's mother would guide the young Don Bosco in the work he was just given.

That 'work' has since spread all over the world and has touched millions of young lives. 

And some of those young lives molded by the teachings of Don Bosco are from an island in the Philippines, in a coastal town called Victorias, where a school bearing his name, was founded in 1952.

(Young Bosconians studying; the lad on the left with a book looks like the young Dr. Jay Eusebio)
(Photo credit: Victorias, A History in Pictures)

For almost 70 years, in the Don Bosco school in Victorias, the Salesian family has nurtured young minds following the congregation's motto "Da mihi animas, caetera tolle" (Give me souls, take away the rest), fostering a brotherhood that is strengthened both in faith and in virtue, taught by the saint and guided by Mary, the Help of Christians. 

(The altar at the Basilica of Mary, 

Help of Christians)

I belong to such brotherhood, a brotherhood that started in Turin, in an area now called Don Bosco Valdocco where I once roamed in a pilgrimage that led me to the room (read blog here) where Don Bosco spent his last days and ended up in a basilica he built in honor of the 'lady' (read blog here) who guided him in his 'work'.  And that 'work' is still being continued by the Salesians of Don Bosco in a congregation of 14,614 bishops, priests, brothers, novices, and seminarians in 133 countries and 1,915 Don Bosco houses, including the one in Victorias.

With millions of brothers as part of the Bosconian brotherhood all over the world, I have a few of mine. 

(They once marched together after finishing their studies at one of Don Bosco's schools in a continent far from Turin where it all started, but brought together by a saint whose dream was to give and shape a good future for boys like them.)

(Photo credit: Mr. Vic Alba, Jr.)

Because once upon a time, in our young lives, our paths crossed under the roof of Don Bosco's teachings and in the halls of learning where our minds were enriched, our characters molded, and our futures shaped by a saint and his work that all started with a dream.🙏

Saint John Bosco was born on August 16, 1815, and died on January 31, 1888, at 72.

(A Bosconian at Don Bosco Valdocco in Turin)

#DonBosco #Bosco #SaintJohnBosco #Bosconian #BosconianBrotherhood #Turin #Italy #MaryHelpofChristians

The Bosconian Brotherhood: Founded by a Saint, Strengthened by Salesian Teachings

I took the express train from the Roma Termini Station in Rome at ten in the morning and arrived at Turin’s Porta Nuova Station about five hours later. Without any tourist map and without anything to eat, I navigated the side streets on foot trying to find my hotel in Turin by locating a busy street named Corso Stati Uniti from memory. I finally found my accommodation after wandering for about 20 minutes but, more important, I also found a sandwich in my bag! I was being watched over! (The prosciutto sandwich was given to me my friend Margarita as 'baon' on my train ride from Rome to Turin, and I forgot all about it.😃) 

(The highlighted portion with brighter colors is the Don Bosco compound in Turin with the Basilica of Mary Help of Christians and the school next to it. This area in Turin is called 'Don Bosco Valdocco'.)

The next morning, armed with a map from the hotel this time, I hopped into a city bus and got off at a bus stop that was about 800 meters from the destination of my dreams. And after walking for minutes, I arrived at Don Bosco Valdocco, the area in Turin where the Basilica of Mary Help of Christians, the church the Virgin herself asked Saint John Bosco to build in her honor, and the Don Bosco school that the saint himself put up are located. After saying a prayer of thanksgiving at the Basilica, I walked around the school and found myself near the Chapel of Saint Francis of Sales where I saw school kids and their teachers started to gather. Realizing that there would be a noontime mass at the chapel, I joined them inside and claimed a seat right behind the group of the young Bosconians. But before the mass, I approached one female teacher and quietly asked, “Señora, es la Misa en Italiano?” She answered, “¡Si!”

         (Don Bosco pointed me to his cafeteria)

Of course, I knew the mass was going to be in Italian; I just had to make sure that there wasn’t really any divine intervention to make the school suddenly arrange for an English mass because of the presence of a visiting Bosconian from Asia whose Italian proficiency was limited to asking directions and ordering pizza. After the mass, I wandered further inside the school following the corner signs and found its cafeteria where, because it was noon, a lot of teachers and students were eating. For me, this wasn’t just a school cafeteria; it was an Italian restaurant! And after ordering (in my survival Italian) and paying for my pizza and pasta, I took a seat at an empty table, said a prayer, took a photo of my food, and wondered whether Saint John Bosco or Saint Dominic Savio had the same food choices more than a century ago when they dined at this cafeteria.

       (The Don Bosco school's cafeteria in 

Turin serves pasta and pizza! 

I can eat here every day!)

         (It was already around 1PM but the cafeteria
            was still full of students and teachers)

But what initially seemed to be a solitary visit to the Don Bosco motherhouse became a group tour as I met at the cafeteria Michele (pronounced mee-ke-le), another visiting Bosconian from the eastern side of Italy. Just like me, Michele felt at home walking around the school and having his lunch there. He even stayed at the dormitory run by the congregation. And even though our respective Don Bosco schools were continents apart, Michele, from Ravenna in the Emilia-Romagna Region in Italy, and I, from Victorias found on one of the Philippine islands, the brotherhood we shared as Bosconians turned us from strangers and into good friends.

(Photographs of the cafeteria of during a special occasion. Notice the white table cloths with set cutlery and Italian wine.)

As Michele had already visited Camarette di Don Bosco, a museum that housed the saint’s personal belongings, including his funeral carriage, I went alone. The museum is in an old building where the saint lived until his death on January 31, 1888. And standing alone inside his bedroom where he spent his last days, I meditated upon this saint’s life who dreamt of spreading the teachings, based on the philosophy of Saint Francis of Sales, to the shores beyond those of Italy. In that bare, small room with a simple bed, I felt that this must have been the place where the saint received most of the divine guidance for his work as well as dreams in his sleep that were messages of encouragement and enlightenment from the Virgin herself. Right next to his bedroom was a small altar where he also said mass. How blessed and fortunate were his students who were able to hear those masses celebrated by a saint!🙏

                                 (Saint John Bosco's bedroom)

          (His private altar next to his bedroom)

And as I was meandering alone through the building - from his bedroom to his altar, and through corners displaying his personal things in this place where this saint prayed, lived and died, I wondered whether the eerie feeling I was experiencing was normal, or was there some presence that accompanied me on this quiet mid-afternoon as I traced this saint’s life through his old portraits and history? Or perhaps, it was just overwhelming for one Bosconian who had spent his formative years learning his teachings through books, prayers, sports and the practice of Christian values, and who was now face to face with the saint’s life.

(Don Bosco's portraits)

                   (Don Bosco's cassock and canes)

Other than Don Bosco’s personal memorabilia, the museum displays photographs and paintings of Saint Maria Mazarello, a nun who helped set up the female branch of the Salesian family that nurtured, educated and guided young girls, and that of Mama Margherita, Don Bosco’s mother who helped him give shelter to the poor and abandoned boys of Turin. While I graduated from my Don Bosco school in Victorias decades ago and haven’t seen these portraits in a long time, memories of my school days, where no time was wasted and hands were never left idle during their waking hours, returned. Even during lunchtime at school, there was also some sports activities one can enjoy.

       (The yard at the Don Bosco school in Turin)

Giovanni Melchiorre Bosco born on August 16, 1815, and died at 72 on January 31, 1888, the date that is now celebrated as his feast day. He was canonized in 1934. And 138 years since his death, his teachings, work, and devotion to Mary, the Help of Christians, are still being continued by the Salesians of Don Bosco consisting of 14, 614 bishops, priests, brothers, novices, and seminarians in 133 countries and 1,915 Don Bosco houses.

(The different flags of a few countries where Don Bosco schools are found. I asked the museum secretary why there was no Philippine flag on display; she said they changed the flags every now and then because it couldn't accommodate all countries. They needed 133 flag poles if they wanted to display all.😄)

Walking with Michele around the walls of the Don Bosco motherhouse in Turin, Italy, breathing the atmosphere of Salesian teachings and the spirit of Bosconian brotherhood, I realized I might never know how many lives have been changed by the saint’s work and teachings. After all, the Salesian family's motto is "Da mihi animas, caetera tolle" (Give me souls, take away the rest). But it doesn't really matter as I am grateful and blessed that one of those souls is mine.  🙏

                         

"Qui con voi mi trovo bene;

è proprio la mia vita stare con voi"

"Here with you I am happy;

it is my life to be with you."

#bosconian #donbosco #saint #donboscovaldocco #maryhelpofchristians #turn #italy #italia #saintdominicsavio #marymazarello #salesians