regarding its conquests, as far as progress and civilisation are concerned. It would be unreasonable and futile to oppose it. Looking at the spirit of his times, Don Bosco thought that today's political setup could be thought of as a steam engine running swiftly down the rails and dragging its freight perhaps, towards a precipice and ruin. Would you like to put yourselves on the railway tracks to stop it?822 In practice, Don Bosco shares a widespread tendency not limited to mere protest but effectively

working to build a new type of man and Christian, one capa ble of integrating authentic values of

traditional belief and the citizen, who accepts the new order. The blending of the two, however, is

imperfect.

Don Bosco and his work are not to be framed within a dichotomous view of the

relationship between traditio n and modernity; nor do they lend themselves to a dialectic

interpretation of the relationship; they should be considered as a virtually synthetic

system.

823

Don Bosco's pre -established goals and the programs he had already set up to achieve them,

substan tially presume the reclaiming of the time -honored educational triad, a renewed an updated one:

piety and morality, knowledge and civilisation.

824But this triad should be seen within a real plan which

sees the values relating to the sujet-citoyen (subject-citizen) and the Christian, tied in with the values relating to reason and religion.

From this perspective, the intrinsic value of the classic realities is clearly stated but at the same time the ultimate goal assigned to culture, civilisation, piety and morality is clearly championed and within a complex view which tends to become a holistic one.

Concretely speaking, Don Bosco thinks and believes as prompted by Christian tradition, namely, that in the order of faith, the recovery of the earthy values should happen as part of the healing and divinising realm of Grace.

As a man, priest and educator, Don Bosco wants to give full value to the human element found in the Christian, to champion all that is positive in creation, to give a Christian dimension to civilisation, showing that only this way can civilisation be fully saved.825

Accepting the coexistence of the above -mentioned values is the style which distinguishes Don Bosco's

entire educational activity and Don Bosco is always and everywhere the priest; he is also the citizen, a member of society, committed to its material and spiritual progress, with his specific contribution.This

is the way Don Bosco saw the members of his religious society juridically and effectively part of civil

society. This intention is indicated in the Historical Outline of 1874:

Let every member be a religious before the Church, and before civil society a free

822An address to past pupils from the Oratory, 24 June 1883 BS 7 (1883)no 8, August, p. 128.

823P. Scoppola, 'Don Bosco e la modernità', in M. Midali (Ed.), Don Bosco nella storia..., p. 537.

824Th triad moeurs-science-politesse appears in the Réglements pour messieurs les Pensionnaires des Pères Jésuites, qui

peuvent leur servir de Règle de conduite pour toute leur vie. Par le R.P. Jean Croiset (Lyon, Frères Bruyset 1749, Vi

éd.): “La piété, lèEtude, la Civilté” (Avertissement, p. I); «Il y a des devoirs dde Religion è remplir, des bienséances à

garder, des sciences à acquérir» (p. 2); «on prétend former un jeune homme dans les bonnes moeurs, dans le beaux arts,

et dans toutes les bienséances et les devoirs de la vie civile... On veut rendre un jeune homme accompli, mais on en veut

faire encore un véritable Chrétien, un parfaitement honnête homme» (p.6)

825The question remains concerning the relationship between temporal and spiritual – B. Plongeron, Affirmation et

transformations d'une «civilisation chrétienne» à la fin du XVIIIe Siècle, in Civilisation chrétienne. Approche

historique d'une idéologie, XVIIIe-XXe siècle (Paris, Beauchesne 1975): «Le christianiser en le civilisant ou bien

l'inverse?» (p. 10). In the same book there is an essay by X. de Montclos on Lavigerie, Le Christianisme et la

civilisation ()pp. 309-348). The archbishop of Algiers was in contact with Don Bosco to whom he sent some young

Algerians, and whom he met in Paris in 1883. Don Bosco's position on the relationship between Christianity and

civilisation offers an analogy with the cardinal's, naturally at aweaker theoretical level sharing the persuasion that they

could be reconciled: cf in particular the Réflexions sur l'idéologie de la civilisation chez Lavigerie, pp. 337-347.