Tratto da Il servo di Dio Fratel Ettore Boschini. Un gigante di carità, di Antonio Casera, edizioni Velar

While he was engaging in his tiring work amongst the various alpine huts and houses of Brentonico (Trento), Ettore came across a friar. This religious was wearing a black cassock and had a large scarlet red cross on his chest. He was a Camillian, the first Camillian Ettore had ever seen. That Camillian was called Guido Coser, he came from San Giuliano di Verona and he was going round the alpine huts and houses in search of butter and cheese for his seminary.

This was the first time that Ettore had seen a Camillian and that large red cross on his chest, as red as the blood of Christ, like passion for the faith, like the fire of trust in God…that red cross struck him, entered his eyes, and descended into his heart.

However, Ettore did not decide at that moment to become a Camillian. But the kindness, the paternal gestures of Brother Coser, and his blessing, were a balsam and gave him relief.

  By now autumn was near. And during the course of an autumn the large red cross of the Camillians would again come into the life of Ettore. In a totally unexpected way.

His exhausting life in the mountains, amongst alpine huts and houses, cows and pigs, was about to finish. His back could no longer take the pace. Ettore was forced to go to Trento and to visit a medical doctor who suspected a hernia in his back and advised him to go to the hospital in Mantua for tests.

Ettore had to wear a plaster cast on the upper part of his body to avoid even the smallest movement. He tried to react and on the bedside table beside the bed, there in that hospital in which he found himself, there was a little holy picture depicting the crucifix of St. Camillus. Ettore picked it up and read what was written on the back. It was the account of a story that had befallen St. Camillus. When reading it, Ettore, however, had the feeling that this story was addressed to him. It was as though someone was telling it to him in order to illuminate the situation he was going through.

He was struck by the phrase of Jesus who when detaching his arms from the cross said to Camillus with a gesture of encouragement: “Do not fear, pusillanimous one, for I will help you, because this is my work not yours”.

Ettore had the impression that Jesus had said those words to him. He concentrated on the matter and thought deeply. And then he said to himself: “I want to be like St. Camillus as well”. And as St. Camillus had done four hundred years previously, when admitted to the Hospital of St. James in Rome, Ettore drew near to people who needed a smile, comfort, peaceful words, an act of help, kindness, and a caress.

   “My vocation was born at that moment’, Ettore would say to everyone, with the picture of the crucifix of St. Camillus in his hands: a vocation to suffering and pain”.

After a sufficient rehabilitation, he left the hospital. Ettore went to the parish priest of his village, Don Corvi, and said to him: “Look, I would like to become a friar who helps sick people”. The parish priest answered him: “The best solution is to enter the Camillian; you will also find a father who was born in this village: Augusto Lucchi”. Ettore answered that he knew about the Camillians and thought of Brother Coser, who had looked for butter and cheese in the alpine huts and villages and had greatly comforted and encouraged him.