Pulcinella tells, but the church won't listen

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1988 marks the centenary of the death of Saint don Giovanni Bosco, famous Italian advocate of children's welfare, founder of the Salesian Order, visionary, counselor to popes, social reformer, gay priest and pedophile. [...]

Born in abject poverty, fatherless and raised in institutions and by relatives, don Bosco rose above his misfortunes with hard work, an indomitable will power,a well-defined set of aspirations and a lifelong mission: to help destitute and abandoned boys to a better life. [...]

After Bosco's death in 1888, a third pope, Pious XI, whom the priest had befriended as a youth, made him a Saint. Don Bosco, according to recent surveys, is the most popular and revered saint in Italy. [...]

One side of the Saint's multifaceted psyche has however remained dark for too long - his repressed and sublimated love for boys - but in Europe this is no longer a secret. In Italy it is commonly referred to as "the secret of Pulcinella." (Pulcinella is Punch and Judy, who, as everyone knows, can never keep a secret.) It's become a laughingstock throughout the Continent, and a growing embarrassment to a silent Vatican. But since the publication of Domande sulla santita (Questions on Holiness) by Sergio Quinzio, the Church has been stirring again, clumsily trying to stifle discussion of Bosco's sexuality and issuing the usual condemnations and denials.

source: Article 'Pulcinella Tells, But the Church Won't Listen' by Renato Corazza; NAMBLA Bulletin, vol. 9, n. 4, May 1988