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Margherita Occhiena was born on April 1, 1788 in Capriglio, Province of Asti near Turin, Italy. She was the sixth of ten children.
When she was 24, she married a widower, Francesco Bosco whose wife and daughter had died leaving him with a three-year-old-son. Unfortunately, however, Mr. Bosco died in 1817 when Margherita was 29, leaving her with three sons to raise: Antonio, Giuseppe, and Giovanni (John).
The eldest son, Antonio, helped his mother by working to provide money for the family to live. Unfortunately, however, he was very mean to his brother Giovanni.
Margherita was a strict but loving mother, and she did her best to raise three sons with very distinct personalities. Of her three sons, Giovanni would become the most famous.
When Giovanni was only nine, he had a vivid dream in which he was in a field of young rowdy boys who were cursing and misbehaving. In the dream, he jumped into the crowd to tame them with fists and shouting. Suddenly, however, a figure appeared to John and put him in charge of the boys. The figure told John that he should lead the boys not with anger and violence, but with gentleness and kindness. The apparition also told John that this would be his life’s work.
John’s older brothers made fun of him when he told them about his dreams. Margherita, however, wisely said that perhaps the dream meant that one day he should become a priest.
As a youth, John had great abilities as a juggler, magician and acrobat. With these gifts, he was able to attract young people for shows that he would put on for them. Before and after his performances, he would lead the crowds in prayer.
When he was around 15, a holy priest encouraged him to enter a seminary. Because John was so poor, his friends had to take up collections to get him all of the clothes and books and other things he needed. In time, he was ordained a priest.
As a young priest, Giovanni worked primarily with poor and abandoned boys who were flocking to the city of Turin. To care for the boys, Fr. Giovanni would rent a house, but in short order, he and the boys would be thrown out of the house because the boys would be too noisy. When they would be thrown out of one place, they would simply go to another place until they’d be thrown out of there too.
Once Margherita’s sons were grown, at the age of 58 she moved to Turin to help her son Giovanni care for the boys that he had brought together to provide a home for them and an education. In a sense, Margherita became a mother to the boys, and she became known as “Mama Margherita” to the hundreds of boys that her son cared for.
In time, some of the older boys decided to stay and help Fr. Giovanni, and other men came to help. This led Fr. Giovanni to found a new religious order whose main purpose was to help poor boys. Because he so admired the French saint, Francis de Sales, his new order became known as the Salesians. In time, Fr. Giovanni also started an order for women to help girls in the same way he was helping the boys.
Margherita faithfully served the boys until her death in Turin on November 25, 1856, at the age of 68. In October 2006, Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed her Venerable.
