Book Reviews and More: 15 Days of Prayer with Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati

15 Days of Prayer with Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati

Père Charles Desjobert, OP

New City Press

ISBN 9781565487185

eISBN 9781565487192

ASIN B0FPNVZQTZ

15 Days of Prayer with Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati - Père Charles Desjobert, OP

I stumbled upon this volume while looking for the letters of Pier Giorgio Frassati. I picked it up and started it the same day. After reading the first day, I recommended it to my youngest two children ages 17 and 15 at the time. When I picked it up I was unaware it was part of a series. About the Series we are informed:

“15 Days of Prayer Series

On a journey, it’s good to have a guide. Even great saints took spiritual directors or confessors with them on their itineraries toward sanctity. Now you can be guided by the most influential spiritual figures of all time. The 15 Days of Prayer series introduces their deepest and most personal thoughts.

This popular series is perfect if you are looking for a gift, or if you want to be introduced to a particular guide and his or her spirituality. Each volume contains:

• A brief biography of the saint or spiritual leader

• A guide to creating a format for prayer or retreat

• Fifteen meditation sessions with reflection guides”

The description of this specific volume states:

“Pier Giorgio is one of those fiery, passionate souls who keeps his eyes fixed firmly on the prize. His life is a testament to the truth that holiness is not just for the saints of the past, but for each one of us. Despite his family's lack of understanding, he amazed everyone not just with his selfless generosity and humility, but with his infectious joy and boundless energy. At the tender age of twenty-four, just as he was about to finish his studies in engineering, Pier Giorgio contracted polio and passed away suddenly on July 4, 1925. This book will introduce you to the life of this remarkable young man, through his writings and the pivotal moments that defined his life of service.”

There is no ‘about the author’ section in the book or on the back. We also not informed specifically who the translator is. The chapters in this volume are:

Introduction: Who Is Pier Giorgio?

Preface to the English Edition

Abbreviations

Translator’s Note

1 To the Heights

2 Ready to Serve

3 Always Joyful

4 The Shady Characters

5 The Trials of Love

6 Have I Lost the Faith?

7 Sitting Exams

8 In Word and in Deed

9 The Interior Man

10 Charity Sows Peace

11 Beyond the Frontiers

12 Right Living

13 Our Daily Bread

14 Time Is Short

15 The Power of Prayer

I highlighted a number of passages while reading this volume some of them are:

“Pier Giorgio’s time was divided between Turin and the family villa at Pollone, about 40 miles to the north, nestled under the Alps and close to the Marian shrine of Oropa. He was very young when he first discovered the mountains. His love for the snowy heights would never stop growing. Walking and climbing, treading new paths along rock faces still out of his reach—all this was the stuff of his dreams.

“At home, he found little support for his faith: Though his grandmother was very devout, his father was agnostic, and his mother practiced mostly out of social habit. And yet, Pier Giorgio deepened his personal prayer life, especially through the Rosary. He received Holy Communion daily, despite his parents’ worrying that he might become a bigotto, “holier-than-thou.””

“His desire to follow Christ blossomed into a fuller commitment. On May 28, 1922, aged twenty-one, Pier Giorgio became a Lay Dominican in the Church of St. Dominic, in Turin. He took the name Brother Girolamo (Jerome) in honor of the Dominican friar, Girolamo Savonarola, whose ardor and determination appealed to him.”

“In his spiritual life, Pier Giorgio relied on invaluable friendships. With his best friend, Marco Beltramo, and six other young men and women, he founded the Society of Shady Characters (Tipi Loschi), on the occasion of a memorable mountain climb, May 18, 1924.”

“The year 1925 began with the opening of the Jubilee doors by Pope Pius XI in Rome. This Holy Year, Pier Giorgio’s last on earth, would be decisive.”

“Pier Giorgio is one of those fiery, passionate souls who keeps his eyes on the prize. Convinced that he cannot merely get along but that he must live to the full, he set out on the demanding way of the Gospel. His life was lived beautifully, in service of the weakest and in humility. This simple and true gift of self, inhabited by a deep joy, was something he achieved in barely twenty-four years.”

“To discover the faith that inspires Pier Giorgio, we will also walk with the saints he was particularly fond of—St. Paul and St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Catherine of Siena—but also Dante and his Divine Comedy. Extracts from the Psalms, which we sing morning, noon, and night in the Divine Office, will be like little prayers to uplift our meditation throughout the book.”

“For Frassati, love of God and love of neighbor formed a single flame, which could not be distinguished. This fire, received in prayer, enabled him to become a light to his brothers and sisters.”

“Some people were fooled. Wasn’t his joy simply the fruit of his perfect health and privileged social standing? In reality, his joy emanated primarily from his uprightness, interior faithfulness, and immense trust in God. It grew progressively, in the midst of suffering and adversity. It burst forth like rare roses among thorns—and what roses!”

“Pier Giorgio realized that joy could not come from the abundance of material possessions. For him, joy comes through contemplating creation, the snowy peaks, the flowering fields in the Alps, and the dark greens of the forests of Piedmont: “Every day, I’m falling more and more in love with the mountains and, if only my studies allowed, I would spend whole days on the mountains to contemplate, in that pure air, the Greatness of the Creator” (August 6, 1923). Nature continuously revealed to him the loving face of God.”

“Enriched by faith and placed under the gaze of God, friendship contributes to the blossoming of our Christian vocation. It is fortified by coming into contact with the friendship that Jesus himself offers us: “No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you” (Jn 15: 15).”

“Convinced of the value friendship brought to his faith, Pier Giorgio was not content to wait for it: He worked at it. He loved to build bridges with his disarming simplicity. His spontaneity touched the hearts of the people around him, even his political opponents.”

“In fact, Pier Giorgio acted with surprising maturity. Such maturity means accepting not to live for oneself but for others. It enabled him, despite his tribulations, to bear witness again to his love for the people in his life: “. . . I can only thank God every moment for having given me parents, teachers, and all my friends, who have all set me on the royal road of the Faith” (March 6, 1925).”

“In Pier Giorgio, faith became a source of strength when it was not the only virtue he had. Thus, two other virtues are added to faith, especially given by God to bring us closer to him: hope and charity. They adorn the letters of St. Paul and also those of Pier Giorgio. These three theological virtues support each other, forming a well-anchored vessel that endures the storm.”

“There remains, however, a bond which one hopes will, by the grace of God, bind together in this world and the next all the Shady Characters. This sacred bond is the Faith, the only strong bond, the only solid ground, without which nothing can be undertaken. And this Faith, received in holy Baptism, which made us companions on some lovely alpine hikes, will accompany us, we hope, right until the last day of our earthly voyage. May it serve as a bond to spiritually cement, by means of prayer, all the Shady Characters dispersed throughout the world. (August 11, 1924)”

“Being ready to follow Christ in sorrows and struggles, not just in moments of peace and rest—that’s how far Pier Giorgio’s faith went.”

“But there’s only true renewal when it is animated by the Gospel. To study is to accept that what is new should burst forth in our life every day. In this sense, all study is an act of contemplation that leads us to a new and better vision of the reality which surrounds us.”

“The Faith given to me at Baptism speaks to me with a sure voice: “On your own, you will do nothing, but if you take God as the center of all your actions, then you will arrive at the goal.” And that is precisely what I want to be able to do, taking as a maxim this saying of St. Augustine: “Lord, my heart is restless until it rests in you.” (January 15, 1925)”

“Like Mary, Pier Giorgio knew himself to be filled with grace. Had he not received grace upon grace? But how difficult it is in practice to abandon oneself to grace, to let it bloom in us! Such a welcome requires humility and, at the same time, makes humility grow.”

“Since a person does not know when Death will take them, it makes very good sense to prepare yourself every day to die that same day. So, from now on, I will try each day to make a little preparation for death, to avoid finding myself unprepared at the hour of death and lamenting the good years of youth, wasted in spiritual terms. And you, what will you do? What do you think of these resolutions, which I hope I can keep by the grace of God? (July 19, 1923)”

“Convinced of the power of prayer for oneself and for others, it saturated his whole day. “Is it true that when you are in your room, you spend a long time in prayer?” a priest questioned him one day. Faced with a dumbstruck Pier Giorgio, he continued: “I know it, your mother told me. Well, you’re causing her some anxiety; she gets up during the night.” “I have so many prayers to say,” murmured Giorgio. “And who is forcing you to say them?” “No one. I just have to say them” (LFJ 68). Even the man of the Church seemed not to grasp the freedom that drove Pier Giorgio to pray. It was because he felt a deep desire to pray that he loved to do it so often. It was no duty except one of love.”

I hope those quotes give you a feel for this volume. I really enjoyed working my way through this book. And I can see myself easily returning to it again in the future. It has also inspired me to get going and read Frassati’s collected letter. The samples in this work were very inspiring and challenging. This is an excellent volume in what looks like a great series.

I believe as of the writing of this review there have been 40 volumes in the series, the earlies I found was from 1999 through to this volume which was published in 2025. Only about a dozen seem to be in print currently and of those only a handful appears to have eBooks. With my dual form of dyslexia this is disappointing. I greatly prefer eBooks so I can change the font, and the colour of font and page to make reading easier. I have added all the eBook editions I could find to my wish list.

As stated an amazing volume about an incredible saint. Frassati is an inspiration no matter our age. His life and witness is incredible and spending this 15 days reading excerpts from his letters, from his prayers, the written reflections and the discussion questions was a moving experience. I can easily recommend this book and look forward to reading others in the series.

Note: This book is part of a series of reviews: 2025 Catholic Reading Plan!

Books in the 15 Days of Prayer With Series:

Blessed Chiara Badano - Florence Gillet and Bill Hartnett

Blessed Frédéric Ozanam - Christian Verheyde

Brother Roger Of Taize - Sabine Laplane

Charles de Foucauld - Michael Lafon

Chiara Lubich - Florence Gillet and Bill Hartnett

Dietrich Bonhoeffer - Matthieu Arnold

Don Bosco - Robert Schiele

Dorothy Day - Michael Boover

Henri Nouwen - Robert Waldron

Jean-Claude Colin - Francois Drouilly