BONACINA, FERDINANDO. - Missionary, died for the faith. Born at Reggio Emilia on April 7, 1804, he entered the Society of Jesus in 1826 as a lay brother. Extremely skilled in various trades, he rendered great services at Tivoli and Rome, to the point of having a project of his for restoring the Acqua Paola aqueduct accepted by Gregory XVI. In 1840 he landed in Syria, where he earned an almost legendary reputation for his strength, goodness and skill, to the point of being proposed by the natives to succeed the Maronite patriarch who died in 1853. He served the mission especially by building houses and churches (the churches of Bikfaya and Zalhe, the seminary of Ghazir, the first college of Beirut, etc.). During the massacres of 1860, he was killed by the Druzes on June 18 together with his superior Fr. Billotet at Zalhe in Lebanon and buried in the church he had built. The process for his beatification has been begun, together with the other martyrs of Lebanon.
Bibliography2 worksP. M. Martin, Notes historiques sur cinq Jésuites massacrés au Mont-Liban en 1860, in A. Carayon, Documents inédits concernant la Compagnie
BIBL.: P. M. Martin, Notes historiques sur cinq Jésuites massacrés au Mont-Liban en 1860, in A. Carayon, Documents inédits concernant la Compagnie de Jésus, XVIII, Poitiers 1865; L. Rocci, I sei martiri del Libano d. Comp. d. Gesù uccisi nel 1860, Isola del Liri 1927, pp. 101-17.
Lamalle, Edmondo. “Bonacina, ferdinando.” In Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. II, col. 1827. Città del Vaticano: Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1949. https://azioneromana.com/article/bonacina-ferdinando.
MLA
Lamalle, Edmondo. “Bonacina, ferdinando.” Enciclopedia Cattolica, vol. II, Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico, 1949, col. 1827. Azione Romana, https://azioneromana.com/article/bonacina-ferdinando.
BibTeX
@incollection{ec2_bonacina_ferdinando,
author = {Lamalle, Edmondo},
title = {Bonacina, ferdinando},
booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica},
volume = {II},
pages = {1827},
note = {Cited by column},
publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico},
address = {Città del Vaticano},
year = {1949},
url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/bonacina-ferdinando}
}
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