Fr. Javier has done it again! Here is his third installment!
Why is it that we stay with Don Bosco? Quite simply, Don Bosco leads us to Christ.
We read in the Biographical Memoirs that the boys at the Oratory used to point to Don Bosco and comment: Doesn’t he look like Jesus? There is a direct testimony to this effect in volume three of the Memoirs
The spell of Don Bosco’s holiness seemed to radiate from his eyes and smile. Boys around him were heard to exclaim over and over again: ‘He looks just like Our Lord!’ a phrase that became habitual with them.
But there is an even more telling way of learning about Don Bosco’s way of leading the young to Jesus. Fr. Peter Braido SDB, has made an exhaustive study of his writings. I am transcribing a short statement taken from Don Bosco’s writings in which he spells out the way to follow Christ.
It is a picture of the Christian, who intends to model his own existence on Jesus’ existence in this life, “reassured that one day he will be glorified in Jesus Christ in Heaven, and reign with him…In fact in a Christian’s life and in his actions it must be possible to identify the life and actions of Jesus Christ himself… so that the genuine Christian should be able to say with St. Paul: It is no longer I who live but it’s Jesus Christ who lives in me.” That is why he prays, “as Jesus prayed on top of the mountain recollected, with humility and full of trust in God;” as Jesus Christ he will be “available to serve the poor, the ignorant, the children”, without arrogance; dealing with others he will be “all for all”, inspirational, charitable, tender and simple; in imitation of Jesus who “washed his apostles’ feet…he will consider himself the least, and the servant of all;” as Jesus was subjected in Nazareth and to the Father “even unto a death on the cross,” “he will be obedient to his parents, his employers, his superiors” as “he obeys God, whom they represent;” as Jesus at Cana and Bethany, he will be “sober, temperate, attentive to the needs of others;” as Jesus was with John and Lazarus, he will share with his friends, entrusting his secrets of the heart and working at bringing back to the state of grace those who may have lost it, he will be patient in his spiritual and physical sufferings; he will be “ready to accept with patience every persecution, every sickness and also death just as Jesus did it”.
Don Bosco subsumes the whole project of the following of Christ in these terms: to make the Christian conscious of the precariousness, seriousness, responsibility and dignity of his existence and the grandeur of his destiny:
Remember, oh Christian, that you are a man of eternity. Every instant of your life is one step towards eternity.
Fr. Javier’s second installment of getting to know Don Bosco, enjoy!
Don Bosco´s somewhat scattered sequence of elementary and secondary education can easily be understood when you take into account his origins, he grew up knowing the life of the country as his were a small farming family.
If God had not called him to be a priest, John Bosco’s life would have been configured by the rhythms of the small farm worker and the share cropper. Mamma Margaret’s interpretation of her son’s dream at age nine (a video of the dream is posted below), was that it meant that he had to get a full education in order to become a priest. Because of that, she made it possible for her Johnny to take the first steps of his education and spared no efforts and sacrifices to insure the completion of his studies all the way to the priesthood.
A good neighbor taught the young boy how to read and work with basic arithmetic. Johnny showed from the beginning outstanding learning gifts and his reading abilities at an early age were put to good use during the cold wintry nights when neighbors gathered together to hear his readings. The elementary years of schooling were somewhat irregular but thanks to a good mind and an eager desire for learning he covered the requirements of the eight basic years of elementary schooling and had exceeded them as he had started taking Latin classes.
By age sixteen (school year 1831-1832) he started the equivalent of the first year of high school and by the end of the year he had completed the equivalent of three years of high school. The following two school years he completed the years of Grammar (1832-1833) and Humanities (1833-1834). He was eligible to skip one year and start the first year of college. He opted to take the final year preparatory to college by taking the course of Rhetoric (1834-1835). It was during this year that he read a whole collection (one hundred volumes) of the Latin and Greek classics.
In the fall of 1835 John started his first college year which was also the first year of his seminary. During the second year of philosophy he lived an experience of conversion. As he relates it himself: “I had some mistaken notions about my studies that could have had sad consequences had I not been saved by a truly providential event. Accustomed to reading the classics all during my school days, I had grown so familiar with outstanding characters of mythology and pagan fables that I found little satisfaction in anything ascetical. The very works of the holy Fathers appeared to me as the products of limited intellects… At the beginning of my second year of philosophy, I paid a visit to the Blessed Sacrament one day. I had no prayer book with me, so I began to read The Imitation of Christ (by Thomas à Kempis). I went through some chapters dealing with the Blessed Sacrament (in the fourth book). I was so struck by the profound thoughts expressed, and the clear and orderly way these great truths were clothed in fine language that I began to say to myself: ‘The author of this book was a learned man…” It was gradually borne in on me that even one verse from it contained so much doctrine and morality as I had found in whole volumes of the ancient classics. To this book I owe my decision to lay aside profane literature.”
Father Javier SDB one of my great teachers and also a great example of a Salesian priest will be adding to the blog from time to time and writing some reflections on St. John Bosco. Here is the first, enjoy!
“Grigio” Don Bosco’s Dog
Looking at Benedict XVI’s coat of arms I was wondering how a bear made its way into one of its quadrants.The story goes that St. Benedict domesticated the ferocious animal that was terrorizing the people of a village. A similar episode is found in the life of St. Francis of Assisi concerning a wolf. The fish listened to a St. Anthony of Padua’s sermon when the people of a locality refused to listen to him. It would seem that the peace and spiritual harmony dominating the existence of these great saints has an effect on creation in general and animals in particular.
In Don Bosco’s life we have his own testimony of the protection offered him by a dog, “Grigio” which accompanied him and attacked men who came to harm him. We read in his Memoirs: “On a wet, foggy night at the end of November 1854 I was coming from the city… I noticed two men following me… they matched their pace to mine…they suddenly jumped me from behind, threw a cloak into my face…and were trying to stuff a rag in my mouth. At that moment “Grigio” appeared growling like a bear. ‘Call off your dog’, they cried. ‘I’ll call him off when you agree to let passers-by alone”. Needless to say “Grigio” won the day.
There are so many testimonies of Don Bosco’s sanctity while he was alive. It is interesting to know that his fame includes his extraordinary influence on animals.
If you didn’t understand the title of this post, don’t worry neither did I, just kidding, it is what would Jesus and Don Bosco do for World Youth Day.
Well I am sure both of them will be there with all the young people, and I think if they were still in their old bodies and were using a computer they would probably sign up for this great social networking site I just found out about.
It can be found here and is called XT3 which stands for Christ in the Third Millennium. It’s basically a facebook account for all those going to WYD or those who can’t go but want to stay connected to all the WYD action. It looks like a good idea so check it out if you’re interested.
This month is devoted to focusing on the love of Jesus. As Catholics we focus on Jesus’ Sacred Heart as the fullness of that love.
You can find a good article explaining the love of Jesus and His Sacred Heart here
If we are not careful, I think it is easy for our lives to become routines and our spiritual life is just along for the ride. Routine is good, it can be helpful in terms of being productive and giving a sense of security, but at the same time it can lull you to sleep most especially in terms of your spiritual life.
The crazy 80’s rock band blasting from your neighbors apartment that will wake you up, get you out of bed and remind you of the rocker you used to be….that is what the Sacred Heart of Jesus is all about.
Jesus loves us all so much. As my good friend says “God delights in you!”. It is true. His Sacred Heart, His Heart that He poured out when He died on the cross is a heart that always and unconditionally loves us. That love, His love, is powerful stuff. It is the stuff that pulls us out of routine, out of ourselves and wakes us up to the reality of those around us.
Because of Jesus’ heart we start to notice the friend that needs our time so she can let out that anger she’s been holding on to for a while. We see that we could help out that homeless guy in a small way if we just gave him some aluminum cans that we collect each week. We realize that we need to spend a little more time in front of Jesus in prayer, asking for help and healing for those we love and care about.
Wake up, get out of that rut, don’t fall asleep in the midst of routine. Realize that each moment is a gift from the Lord instead of just another couple of minutes to get something else “done” and checked off your to-do list. St. John Bosco once said, “If one has true love, he or she will seek nothing else but the greater glory of God”. Be awake and ever ready to serve Him who loves you.
Many people know what a priest or a nun or sister is, but few understand what a brother is. Right now there are about 60,000 religious brothers in the world, why is it that they are so unknown?
Although I am studying to be a religious priest, my friend and brother (Sandy) is studying to become a brother. Often times I hear people ask him and other brothers:
What is a brother? What can you do as a brother? Is that a mini-priest? Is that a priest’s sidekick? Why don’t you wanna be a priest?
Being a brother, also called “lay brother” or “coadjutor brother” is a lot more about who you are and a lot less about what you do.
Read about two holy Salesian Brothers
Blessed Brother Zatti here Venerable Simon Srugi here.
Let’s start from the beginning. God calls all of us to a specific way to serve Him. That’s our vocation! Dude! Some are called to be married, some are called to the single life, others are called to the religious life or priesthood.
Being called to be a brother is being called to live a life of closeness to Jesus. You take the vows: obedience, poverty and chastity and you also promise to live with a group of men for a specific mission, in our case as Salesians we focus on working for the young and the poor.
You vow yourself to these things to imitate Jesus in a profound way. Jesus lived an obedient, poor and chaste life. I have heard it explained this way: a brother is like someone takes the Eucharist to others, from an outward appearance a brother does not necessarily look different from those that are married and single, however because he has a close relationship with the Lord, wherever he goes, he brings Jesus to that place or those people.
St. John Bosco often talked about the importance of having both brothers and priests in the Salesian Congregation. Both are necessarily for saving souls and building up society.
A Salesian Brother may be a youth minister, teacher in a school, coach, director of a mission office, among so many other ministries, but what is most important is not what he does but who he is.
We need more men to come forward and think about the possibility of serving the Church as a brother, as one who gives his whole self for the young and the poor and at the end of the day tries merely to imitate Jesus as best he can.
Here are two pictures from our Corpus Christi procession. We walked through the streets of our village carrying Jesus. This feast which was last Sunday celebrated the great gift of the Eucharist, where Jesus gave us His body, blood, soul and divinity by changing common bread and wine into himself.
St. John Bosco always taught his boys and Salesians the importance of the Eucharist. We love You Jesus, thank you for the great gift of Yourself!
I am in one of these pictures but you’ll have to play where’s Waldo to find me Enjoy
Our spiritual life, our walk towards God is a lot like a garden. We are trying to cultivate some beautiful flowers, trees, fruit, and vegetables but the more we try to grow, the more weeds seem to pop up.
These weeds are our sins and interestingly enough, people approach their “weeds” differently.
Some want to ignore them, focus on the beauty in their life and try to grow the flowers and trees more beautiful, ignoring the weeds in hopes that they will go away.
Others try to watch the garden like a hawk and pull out the weeds at their very infancy. The only problem with this is that some become so paranoid about a weed, that they sometimes pull out the new fruit trees or flowers by accident, thus impeding new growth.
Some too, seem to have the same weeds pop up week after week, or after weeding one week notice that the next week many weeds are back and then become discouraged.
As our life goes on, as our garden grows, weeds will come. We can’t ignore them, we can’t get so paranoid that the possibility of them consumes us, and finally we can’t get discouraged when old ones appear again or new ones come.
It is time my friends to bust out the real-deal, Ally Mc Beal, pull my tail and I’ll squeal, honest to goodness weed killer. It doesn’t matter what brand of weed killer you buy, as long as it contains a few active ingredients.
1. First you need Confession. Why is it so hard for us to tell a priest our sins? I think it’s because we think the priest is going to judge us, or be taken aback by what we did. As if the priest hasn’t heard sins that are far worse than ours! I think too that we forget that it is Jesus forgiving our sins through the priest and not the priest himself.
2. We also need to try to make small changes in our life so that we get out of old ruts and steer away from old sins.
3. Finally we need to recognize that sins or “weeds” will challenge us throughout our life to deeper spiritual growth, let us not be discouraged by them, but instead admit our need for Jesus, our need to grow and then move closer to our Lord.
Weed-killin’ is that easy, have courage, get to work and in no time you’ll have your garden and your life lookin’ reaaal niccce!
Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini S.J. gave a talk in May 2007 that was highlighted in the May 12 issue of America Magazine. The article is excellent and can be found in its entirety here (scroll down about half way to find it)
Cardinal Martini states that living in the time that we do, a time he calls “post modern” where truth is no longer objective but primarily subjective, we Catholics should mend our approach to men and women of other faiths by focusing on the beauty of our faith and tradition. If we are to do that though, if we are to teach the faith to others we must be spiritual strong.
He challenges those who want to teach the faith to embrace four attitudes and then gives us four exercises to develop these attitudes. If you are ready for a spiritual workout suit up!
First Attitude: Don’t be surprised by diversity. Look upon everything that is different and new with regards to people’s beliefs with an open mind. Don’t judge them right away. Then follow St. Paul’s advice of discerning, thinking through with prayer, what they have said and keep the good and get rid of the bad.
Second Attitude: Take risks. Faith is the greatest risk of life let us be willing to give up everything for Jesus and His Gospel, also let us make sure we communicate this to others.
Third Attitude: Befriend the Poor. Put the poor at the center of your life, Jesus did, He even made himself poor.
Fourth Attitude: Nourish Yourself with the Gospel. If we know the Gospel we will know Jesus.
I don’t know about you but it looks to me like I have some work to do in my life
Now here’s how practically speaking we can work our spiritual muscles and get big for Jesus.
First Exercise: Lectio Divina. This means finding some time each day to read and pray through some of the scriptures. If you become good at this the Word of God will begin to accompany you throughout the day.
Second Exercise: Self Mastery. If you always give into your desires you end up being bored and fat and lazy. That is no way to serve Jesus! Instead try to deny yourself sometimes and put others first, you will see that this path leads to true joy.
Third Exercise: Silence. Get off the cell, put the ipod away, stop reading this blog (well you don’t have to go to extremes) Build into your schedule 15 minutes a day of quiet time to think about yourself, reflect, think about what God is doing in your life etc. If you really want a work out double this time to 30 minutes. Take some extra time (possibly on Sunday) to do some more reflecting, spiritual reading (reading books that build you up spiritually) etc.
Fourth Exercise: Humility. You don’t have to solve every problem. Let God do His work and be patient enough for Him to do His work. Leave room for the Lord and be open to trying to see Him working in your daily life.
Hopefully after that workout your are recharged! Don’t worry about tackling all these exercises and mastering all these attitudes right away. Start with one and go from there. Just like with physical exercise, start small and build up a routine
it is what would Jesus and Don Bosco do for World Youth Day.
