Saint Dominic Savio

St. Dominic Savio was born at Riva di Chieri on April 2, 1842 AD. He was one of ten children of a blacksmith and a seamstress. The family moved to Murialdo, near Castelnuovo d'Asti, when he was two.

Children in Piedmont then waited until eleven or twelve for First Communion. The parish priest examined him, consulted the neighbouring priests, and admitted him at seven in 1849 AD. He asked his mother's pardon the night before.

He started at the municipal school of Castelnuovo d'Asti on June 21, 1852 AD, not yet ten years old. The school was some distance from home and he walked there and back. His health began to fail, so in November 1852 AD the family moved to Mondonio.

In 1853 AD a school offence came to light that carried immediate expulsion. The culprit and his friends laid it on St. Dominic Savio, who hung his head and said nothing. The real culprits were found the next day, and the headmaster asked him why he had not cleared himself.

In October 1854 AD he walked with his father to Murialdo to meet Saint John Bosco. Handed a book and told to learn page nine, he came back and recited it within eight minutes. On October 29, 1854 AD he entered the Oratory of St Francis de Sales at Valdocco, outside Turin, as a boarder.

On December 8, 1854 AD Pope Pius IX defined the dogma of the Immaculate Conception at Rome. That evening St. Dominic Savio knelt at Our Lady's altar and renewed the promises of his First Communion. Pope Pius XII, canonizing him a century later, said that day saw him raised in an ecstasy of love towards the Virgin Mary.

Six months into his time at Valdocco he heard a sermon on an easy way to the perfection of the saints. He began pressing for penances and for hours at a time in prayer.

He put sharp pieces of iron and wood in his bed and kept only summer coverings through January. Each device was found out and stopped, because his superiors judged them unsuitable for his years and his health. St. John Bosco told him instead that the penance God wanted from him was obedience.

Two boys at the Oratory agreed to fight with stones and would not be talked out of it. St. Dominic Savio made them promise one condition first, without telling them what it was.

At the ground fixed for the fight he knelt between them and held up a crucifix. Neither boy would throw at him, and the quarrel ended there. Both of them went to Confession afterwards.

In 1856 AD he gathered companions into the Company of the Immaculate Conception and drew up its rule. The rules were read out before Our Lady's altar on June 8, 1856 AD, nine months before he died.

Pope Pius XII said he urged his companions to the sacraments, to the Rosary and to flight from temptation. Pope Pius XII added that bad receptions and insolent replies did not stop him.

The first signs of the illness that killed him appeared in the summer of 1856 AD. A doctor put the decline down to a delicate constitution and the constant strain of his mind. He left the Oratory for his father's house at Mondonio on March 1, 1857 AD.

The doctor there put him to bed and bled him ten times in four days. He asked his father to call the priest, and received the Last Sacraments. On March 9, 1857 AD he was given the Papal Blessing, and that evening he died, aged fourteen.

They buried him in an ordinary grave in the little graveyard of Mondonio. The country people of the district called him their *piccolo santo* (*little saint*). In 1914 AD his remains were raised at nightfall, the villagers being hostile to their removal, and taken to the Basilica of Mary Help of Christians at Turin.

Pope Pius XII beatified him on March 5, 1950 AD, with crowds of young people filling St Peter's. Pope Pius XII canonized him in St Peter's Square on June 12, 1954 AD. The Church keeps his feast on March 9, the day he died.