DON BOSCO - THE SAINTLY FOUNDER
The Three Promises - his salvific itinerary
Why did Don Bosco found a congregation? Was that part of his dream at nine? It wasn't. It was no where in the horizon. Not even the historical context warranted such a move of founding a religious congregation while dozens of others were being suppressed and clamped down. What was in Don Bosco's mind? Of course, the mission given to him in his dream: show them the beauty of virtue and ugliness of sin; win them over with your loving kindness. In due time, he was promised that he would understand what he was called to.
Don Bosco began to work for a small group of young people who needed him the most and that small group grew bigger by the day! At a point of time, he realised that even without being much conscious of it, he had opened himself to a mighty big world that the Lord held before him. Those words of our Blesssed Mother in the dream, "This is your field" was coming alive in ways and magnitude that were unprecedented. Don Bosco could not be satisfied with leading a few youngsters to God, he wanted to lead all the youth from all over the world, to God and to salvation! And the Congregation and the Salesian Family was the salvific itinerary that he proposed. An itinerary that consisted of three promises, three concrete promises - Bread, Work and Heaven!
Da mihi animas, caetera tolle - that yearning to take the young to the Lord was uppermost in the heart of the saintly founder, who considered that not only as his passion, but also the way to his salvation. He proposed the same to his followers, his sons and daughters, his family, which stands spread far and wide today as Salesian Family. And this salvific itinerary, Don Bosco made it sound so simple with his three promises!
Bread - that was the promise of the Divine Providence. When Jesus called, if you wish to be my disciple, give up everything, take up your cross and then, come follow me, Jesus was underlining the God who provides, the God who takes care of our every need! The promise of bread is not so much a promise of convenience and absence of suffering, but a challenge to a way of life that is totally dependent on God! A life of poverty that depends on God and thrives on God's providence.
Work - that was the promise of Divine Will. Work is not just doing, it is not achieving, it is not sealing my name on everything around me, as if to say, I own them all! Work, more than doing, is the vocation to do the Will of God. The one who does the will of the Father is my brother, my sister, my mother! Don Bosco's promise of Work was born from his conviction that he was an instrument in the hands of God, and everyone who joined him became such an instrument. A life of obedience, that concerns itself with doing the will of God and nothing but the will of God.
Heaven - that was the promise of Divine Intimacy. We are a people of God, citizens of heaven, our celestial destination. But all the way to heaven, is heaven! That is the call we accept when we pray, 'May your kingdom come'. When we live a life of total dependence on God, a life totally for the will of God, that would be a life of pure and spotless love, the love that is born from the love of God, from that divine Intimacy that creates a paradise, wherever we are!
Don Bosco's promises etch an itinerary so sure to take us all the way to that salvation that awaits each of us - the divine providence that sustains us, the divine will that guides us and the divine intimacy that sanctifies us. Let us walk with Don Bosco, profoundly certain that we are on a salvific itinerary.
Don Bosco began to work for a small group of young people who needed him the most and that small group grew bigger by the day! At a point of time, he realised that even without being much conscious of it, he had opened himself to a mighty big world that the Lord held before him. Those words of our Blesssed Mother in the dream, "This is your field" was coming alive in ways and magnitude that were unprecedented. Don Bosco could not be satisfied with leading a few youngsters to God, he wanted to lead all the youth from all over the world, to God and to salvation! And the Congregation and the Salesian Family was the salvific itinerary that he proposed. An itinerary that consisted of three promises, three concrete promises - Bread, Work and Heaven!
Da mihi animas, caetera tolle - that yearning to take the young to the Lord was uppermost in the heart of the saintly founder, who considered that not only as his passion, but also the way to his salvation. He proposed the same to his followers, his sons and daughters, his family, which stands spread far and wide today as Salesian Family. And this salvific itinerary, Don Bosco made it sound so simple with his three promises!
Bread - that was the promise of the Divine Providence. When Jesus called, if you wish to be my disciple, give up everything, take up your cross and then, come follow me, Jesus was underlining the God who provides, the God who takes care of our every need! The promise of bread is not so much a promise of convenience and absence of suffering, but a challenge to a way of life that is totally dependent on God! A life of poverty that depends on God and thrives on God's providence.
Work - that was the promise of Divine Will. Work is not just doing, it is not achieving, it is not sealing my name on everything around me, as if to say, I own them all! Work, more than doing, is the vocation to do the Will of God. The one who does the will of the Father is my brother, my sister, my mother! Don Bosco's promise of Work was born from his conviction that he was an instrument in the hands of God, and everyone who joined him became such an instrument. A life of obedience, that concerns itself with doing the will of God and nothing but the will of God.
Heaven - that was the promise of Divine Intimacy. We are a people of God, citizens of heaven, our celestial destination. But all the way to heaven, is heaven! That is the call we accept when we pray, 'May your kingdom come'. When we live a life of total dependence on God, a life totally for the will of God, that would be a life of pure and spotless love, the love that is born from the love of God, from that divine Intimacy that creates a paradise, wherever we are!
Don Bosco's promises etch an itinerary so sure to take us all the way to that salvation that awaits each of us - the divine providence that sustains us, the divine will that guides us and the divine intimacy that sanctifies us. Let us walk with Don Bosco, profoundly certain that we are on a salvific itinerary.
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