64. The dream of the garden, 1867
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First part: Three dead.
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On December 31, 1867, Don Bosco gathered in the Church all the personnel of his Oratory of Turin (more than 800) and going up to the pulpit he told them: "I was thinking and praying to give you a resolution or motto or Strenna for the year that is about to begin, and I dreamed the following: It seemed to me that I came to a beautiful and enormous garden which had this sign: 'NEW YEAR, 1868.' There were a great number of young people there, who approached me and accompanied me to walk through that beautiful field.
Then we met a small group of boys with some priests and they were saying prayers for the deceased ("Give them eternal rest, Lord... etc.). I approached them and asked: "Why are you saying these prayers? Is it because someone has died? - Yes - they told me - It is that NN has died (and they told me his name). He died on such-and-such a day at such-and-such an hour.
- What do you mean, that well-known one died? - I asked them.
- Yes, he died, but he had a holy death, an enviable death. He received the Holy Sacraments with great devotion.
He accepted with resignation the sufferings that God allowed to come to him and showed the most lively sentiments of piety.
We pray for him, but we have the hope that he will already be in paradise.
I added: "He died a holy death. Let us ask God to imitate his virtues and to grant us also the grace to have a good and holy death.
I continued walking through the meadow surrounded by a large number of young people, and then we saw a group of boys kneeling around a coffin, praying prayers for the deceased ("Give them eternal rest, Lord, etc.). I approached them and asked: "For whom are you praying? They answered me very saddened: - We are praying for NN (and they told me his name).
- He was sick for eight days. His relatives came to visit him. He went to confession and communion with great piety and received the Anointing of the Sick. He died a holy and peaceful death.
I asked them: - But two deaths on the same day? And they answered me: - No, it is not on the same day. From the one who died before to the one who died now, three months have passed.
I continued walking with the young people who accompanied me and we arrived at a forest.
There we saw a group of boys approaching us, saying prayers for the deceased. I asked them, "Where are you going and why are you praying?
They answered me, disconsolate and crying: - Ah if you only knew what has happened! A young man has died. His parents did not come to visit him. And he died in a very undesirable way. He did not die a holy death.
- But didn't he receive the Holy Sacraments? - I asked them.
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- At first he did not want to go to confession or receive communion or the anointing of the sick. Later he accepted to receive these sacraments but reluctantly and without repentance or piety. We were badly impressed and have doubts that he was saved. We were saddened that a young man from our group died such an unpleasant death.
Immediately a personage appeared to me and said: "Look, there are three who are going to die this year. Tell your disciples that just as the death of the first two filled them with consolation and hope because they received the Holy Sacraments with fervor, because during their lives they had always received them with piety and devotion, so what happened to the third one filled them with sadness, because when he was in good health he did not receive communion or go to confession and when the hour of his death came, he had very little devotion and piety in receiving the sacraments. Tell them that those who want to have a good and holy death should receive communion frequently with true devotion. So the motto or Strenna for the coming year will be: "Frequent and devout communion is a very effective means to obtain a good and holy death".
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Part Two: The horns on the head.
The guide then took me to a large field where there was a countless crowd of young men. I looked at them carefully and saw something that filled me with horror: on the heads of many of them there were two horns. Some had short horns and others very long ones. Some had full horns and others had split horns. Some showed signs of having had horns, but they had been cut off and the scar had healed. Others, on the other hand, had horns that were growing alarmingly. And some not only accepted having two horns on their heads but were proud to have them, and were dedicated to goring their companions. And I was struck by the fact that some had only one horn in the middle of their heads, but large and fierce, and they were the most dangerous to hurt others. I also saw some with beautiful and serene foreheads that had never been marred by such a deformity. I can tell each of my pupils in what state I saw each one there.
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Part three: The three misfortunes or calamities.
Then the guide took me to a height from where I observed a plain full of combatants fiercely killing each other. And he said to me: "There will be war and much blood will be shed.
We withdrew from that field of death and passed into a garden and there we heard a shrill and frightening cry that said: - Let us flee from here. Let's run away from here.
I saw people running away and from time to time some of them fell dead on the ground.
I asked one of those who were running away: - What's going on, why are you running away? And he said to me, very frightened: - A cholera epidemic is coming. Up to 50 deaths a day in a single sector.
We continued walking and further on we saw a great number of pale people, without courage, weakened, with their clothes torn to shreds. I asked: "What is happening to them, what does this state they are in mean? And a voice answered me: "There will be a great famine and a great scarcity of food, and the people will have nothing to buy what they need.
Then I heard the crowd shouting, "Hunger, hunger, we are hungry! And they were looking for something to eat and could not find it.
The remedies.
I asked the guide: - And this will happen very soon? - Yes, it is about to happen.
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- And what remedies can be employed to ward off such great evils? - These evils will go away if people make serious efforts not to sin. If they stop using that improper vocabulary they use. If they honor Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament with the Holy Mass, Communion and visits to the Blessed Sacrament, and if they invoke more Mary Most Holy, whom many have forgotten so much.
- And what can I do so that these misfortunes will not befall my disciples? The guide looked at me fixedly and said: "Tell your disciples that if they want to see God's punishments far from them, they should dedicate themselves with real effort to avoid sin as much as possible. Let them be devoted to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament by attending Holy Mass, receiving Holy Communion and visiting the Blessed Sacrament in the Temple, and let them honor Mary Most Holy as very affectionate children. But keep in mind that it is enough that there is only one person who wants to continue living in grave sin, for that person to bring punishment from God and misfortunes for the whole house.
At that moment, a terrible storm broke out and a terrible hailstorm began to fall, and I was hit on the head by a hailstone so big that... it woke me up.
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My good friends: let us try to do all we can to avoid sin as much as possible. Let us prepare ourselves to die a holy death in case we have to die this year. Let us pray with much devotion to the Blessed Virgin and let us not forget the motto or Strenna for this year: - "Confession and frequent and devout communion are a great remedy to save the soul".
Good night.
Explanations: The Salesian Esteban Bourly wrote the dream as he heard it told that night to Don Bosco, and the Salesians Joaquín Berto and José Bologna proposed to write down well the data happened during that year to see if the announcements made by the Saint when narrating this dream were fulfilled. In that year three young men of the Oratory died. At first one, who died very saintly. Three months later another one died, personally assisted by Don Bosco. And later the third one died, whom Father Cagliero barely managed to make him go to confession before he died.
In the horns on the head he could see very clearly the spiritual state of his pupils and even know some of them who were doing a lot of evil.
The three misfortunes happened in that year in a very painful way and the Oratory of Turin itself suffered a lot because of the scarcity of food and because the parents of the students had been left in such great poverty that they could not afford to pay the modest pension that was charged to them there.
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But those who lived in the grace of God, and were devoted to the Blessed Sacrament and the Virgin Mary, warded off the epidemic and obtained much help from God for all in the house.
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65. Jumping over the torrent, 1868
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On April 17, 1868, the Father Director of the college of Lanzio, where Don Bosco was staying, asked him why he had shouted during the night, screaming in terror. The Saint told him that that night he had had the following dream: I dreamt that I was on the bank of a torrent, not very wide but with turbid and stormy waters. Many students were trying to jump in and cross to the other side.
Some of them started to jump several meters back and managed to land on their feet on the dry part of the other bank, like good gymnasts. But others failed. Some would land on their feet on the inside of the bank and lose their balance and fall backwards into the water. Others fell noisily into the center of the stream and disappeared. Some hit their heads or chests against the stones that stood out of the water, cracking their skulls and pouring blood out of their mouths.
I was anxious to watch these painful scenes, and I shouted and clapped my hands, warning the young men to be more prudent, but it was all to no avail.
The torrent was filling up with corpses that were rushing from waterfall to waterfall and ended up crashing against a rock that stood out in a place where the torrent turned, and where the water was deeper, and disappeared swallowed by a whirlpool. There was fulfilled what Psalm 42 says: "One abyss calls another abyss".
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How many of my beloved disciples who hear this dream are carried away by the water of the foaming torrent, in danger of being lost forever. But how, being such joyful people, so full of life, so courageous, do they let themselves be carried away by the current? Why do they fail when they try to jump to the other side of the torrent? It may be because they have some companion, some friend who trips them up, who pulls them back, or who gives them a push, whereupon they lose their balance and fall into the stormy waters, and fail to jump, and may be lost forever.
And it may be that many of those unfortunate ones who do the work of demons and seek the spiritual ruin of others, will also hear this dream. (We should tell them the words of Our Lord: "Woe to him who scandalizes one of these little ones: it would be better for him if a very heavy stone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the depths of the sea"). I ask you: - Why do you want to inflame evil passions in the hearts of others with your bad conversations? Why do you mock those who pray and receive the sacraments and with your mockery keep some from receiving them? With this, the only thing you get are punishments from God. I beg you: stay away from sin. Try seriously to save your own souls. I want to help you all to attain the Eternal Paradise.
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The shore from which the young people jump is the ordinary everyday life. The shore they want to reach is the glory of paradise. The water of the torrent is the sins and the occasions of sin, which drag and cause spiritual death to people. The cries that the Father Director heard in Don Bosco's room were the warnings that he sent to the imprudent ones who threw themselves carelessly and were going to be swept away by the current.