In Don Bosco's dreams there is nineteenth-century Turin, a city still with a population of less than 100,000 inhabitants but rich in industrial and political ferment. There is the Church, with the vicissitudes of an exalted and persecuted Papacy; there is the scenography of an urban landscape still mixed with the rural and peasantry ambiance. There are the young people, finally protagonists in spite of a society that had ignored them for so long. And then there is the encounter with the Lord Jesus, the great Mother and Help of Christians, the practice of the sacraments and great processions; the struggles with the devil and his wiles to defeat him. There is the development of his work, of which Don Bosco was delighted because it was at the service of those young people whom he wanted all in Paradise and also happy here on earth. There are openly clairvoyant dreams I would dare say on par with biblical dreams so imbued with supernatural presence.
Don Bosco lived the development of his work and he also lived the suffering, his limitations and shortcomings. Pope St. Paul VI, who knew the Salesians well and had promoted their works as a great friend of the Salesians, used to say that the development of the Salesians in the world reminded him of the parable of the evangelical seed, just as he considered Don Bosco among the great holy Founders in the history of the Church of all times. After all, even today it happens that someone knocks on a Salesian school door and asks to speak to Don Bosco thinking he is alive.
Scattered in over 130 countries with the most varied activities aimed at education of the youth, the Salesians represent, according to UNESCO data, the largest private association in the world operating in this sector. And certainly, if one looks at the numbers, this is indeed the case: more than 14,000 religious plus 32 groups adhering to the Salesian Family made up of the same number of consecrated and non-consecrated Religious, Religious, Laymen and Laywomen, -are they not the realization of Don Bosco's dreams?
Undoubtedly there are also difficulties with regard to newer vocations -especially in the old continent of Europe. This dearth of vocations weighs heavily at a time when 48% of Salesians are still in formation. This is why we need to return to Don Bosco the dreamer, to the essentiality of his asceticism made up of work, prayer, the fulfilment of one's duties with a relationality made up of reason, religion and loving kindness.
The dream at the age of 9 to which Don Bosco's 10th successor, the Rector Major, Cardinal Don Ángel Fernández Artime wanted to dedicate the Strenna 2024 means precisely this. "Don Bosco," the Cardinal wrote to the Salesian Family, "showed us throughout his life that only authentic relationships transform and save. Pope Francis tells us the same thing: 'It is not enough, therefore, to have structures if authentic relationships are not developed in them; it is the quality of these relationships, in fact, that evangelizes'".
"For this reason," continues the Rector Major, "I express the desire that every house of our Salesian Family in the world be or become a truly educational space, a space of respectful relationships; a space that helps to grow in a healthy way. In this we can and must make a difference, because authentic relationships are at the origin of our charism, at the origin of the encounter with Bartholomeo Garelli, at the origin of Don Bosco's own vocation".
Fr Giuseppe Costa,
Co-spokesman of the Salesian Congregation
Source: Avvenire
