A gift for the Provincial: the value of a source

What to give to the Father Provincial? This is the question that Jesuits, authorities, communities, lay people have surely asked themselves on different occasions: Christmas, Easter, birthdays. The historical archive provides some suggestions on the subject. The historical archive provides some suggestions on the subject.

It must not have been easy to find a gift for a religious, and a provincial at that: a Jesuit in charge of a province, hundreds of brothers, dozens of institutes and works, with little free time and a very busy schedule.

Some of the students at the Arici College must have found themselves in this great dilemma with regard to the Provincial of the Veneto-Milan Province of the Society of Jesus.

In fact, during the tidying up of the folders relating to the Arici College in Brescia, a small handwritten notebook was found, characterised by childish handwriting, drawings and frames, you can see it in the photo accompanying the archive.

It appeared to be a school notebook, but was actually a gift, a gift for the Provincial.

The accompanying letter, signed “the pupils of the primary schools”, reads:

“Very Reverend Father Provincial,

we are all gathered here to offer you our reverent greetings. We would like to tell you many things, but we, who are so chatty [così nel testo] do not know how to express all the feelings our heart feels for Your Reverence.

We only tell you that we have prayed for you so much these days and have made little flowers according to your intentions, certain that this was the best means of expressing ourselves.

What we have not been able to say, ask these flowers, to whom we have entrusted the task of replacing us.

Now Most Reverend Father Provincial, please give us your paternal Blessing.

The gift was probably made on the occasion of a canonical visit of the Provincial to the College. What foils did these children offer the Provincial?

Let us sell some of them together: in some cases they are renunciations, in others good deeds.

Some recall more or less great sacrifices: “I kept silent”, “I picked up the nib holder from the ground”.

some betray some pain in their renunciation: ‘I did not linger to look at the little fish I like so much’.

There are those who forgive: ‘I forgave one of my classmates who had pushed me down the stairs’, while others give more details about their sacrifice ‘on the last day of carnival I did not go out to see the masks, but stayed at home and covered my books’.

As many as six children report that they gave up candy, a sacrifice that certainly has great value for a child.

Some do good deeds for their parents: “I went to get my mum’s coffee and milk”, “I took the suitcase to my dad” or towards their classmates “I would have liked to distribute the blackboards myself, instead I let my classmates distribute them”.

Someone stays on the path of renunciation and reports: ‘I wanted to buy the exercise book for my drawings, instead I didn’t buy it’.

Some say that ‘while the teacher was turned away, I didn’t speak’, while others confess ‘I would have liked to have hung up my coat on the teacher, but I let a classmate hang it up’.

Lastly, there are the profoundly honest authors of the following foils: ‘I didn’t feel like praying, instead I prayed’, ‘this morning I didn’t want to eat breakfast instead I did’, and those who are even more precise: ‘I gave the ball to my comrade Ceresetti’.

This is not a particularly attractive source for researchers, but it reminds us of the value of every document, whether it is an official act or a personal diary: that of transmitting information and handing down the memory of the person who made it and the context in which it originated.

This document, thanks to some extrinsic and intrinsic elements (the handwriting, the coloured frames, the reference to contemporary objects such as the pen holder, the paltò, the concept of sacrifice for children) also tells us a lot about the era in which it was produced, going beyond the mere content related to the fioretti, although very interesting and certainly appreciated by the Provincial of the time.

Maria Macchi