CONTENTS Spendh a Few Moments in Prayer
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DON BOSCO'S MADONNA Mumbai JANUARY 2016 vol.17 No. 9 HE NEVER TOLD ME HE LOVED ME! ere at the Shrine I see interesting things. I see parents interacting with their kids – fathers babysitting their babies while mothers CONTENTS spendH a few moments in prayer. I notice elderly parents being lovingly led to their pews by caring sons or daughters. Those gestures sometimes tear me up and warm my heart. I often say to myself, From The Editor's Desk: He Never Told Me He Loved Me............3 that I’ve got to be really insensitive if that doesn’t make me emotional. That’s what family-love is all about, isn’t it? The Art of Giving Strange that another memory came back to me as I was looking - Fr. Erasto Fernandez. SSS...4 down one Sunday morning from the choir loft at the shrine where I take my perch: years ago, in the course of a chat, someone Youth on the Move:The Church of complained to me that his father had never told him that he loved Tomorrow - Giuliano Palizzi......7 him. He didn’t really doubt that his father did love him; it was only that he wished he had said it. He admitted that nowadays parents Vocation Story: Fr. Aldo Marchesini......10 do feel embarrassed to say it. It seems unnecessary. Even so, now that he has grown up and gotten married, he decided that he would Salesian Saint: Bl Magdalene Morano...11 tell his son that he loved him - only, he feared the boy would say that this was mush! Witnesses In And For Our Times: O God, whose eternal Word The opportunity came sooner than he expected. On a wet day he St Severinus of Noricum..........12 adorns the face collected the lad from school and after the father parked the car he Lectio Divina: In Search of A Treasure of the heavens took the risk and told his son that he loved him. Well the boy didn’t - Cl. Ian Pinto, sdb...............16 say it in so many words, but kept looking out of the window…his yet accepted from face grew beet red with embarrassment, obviously the boy thought Quietspaces: Without Mary Jesus Cannot the Virgin Mary it was mush, of course, but still the father was glad he had said it; Be Understood - Pope Francis.....18 now his son would always know that he was loved. the frailty of our flesh, That father was not the only one to want his child to know that he As A Tree Falls grant, we pray, loved him. God had thought of it long ago. That is what baptism is - Fr. Ian Doulton's Collection...20 all about. God the Father did not miss the opportunity to say so at that he who appeared his Son’s baptism. He let the Spirit descend on Jesus and told Jesus Don Bocso’s Identity: among us as the splendour that he loved him (his beloved Son). You miss the point if you do not Don Bosco’s Tenacity (10) realise that this applies to you too! A preface used in Mass puts it - Fr. Elias Dias, SDB..................24 of truth this way: that God the Father sees and loves in us what he sees and loves Reflecting on Mary: Among the doctors may go forth in the fullness in Christ. That’s why you’ve got to take the hint! Maybe it is because the world is always telling us that you get in the Temple of power - Bernardina do Nascimento...28 nothing for nothing, that it’s so tough to get our minds around the for the redemption fact that God gives us his love even before we could possibly deserve Newsbits...............................................31 of the world. it, or even after we have offended him – oh so many times at that. If we can’t feel the need for our parents to tell us they love us and In a Cheerful Mood.....................15 Who lives and reigns with The Devotion of repeat it again and again, it is probably not surprising that we can the Three Hail Marys............33 you in the unity forget that we are loved by God with an unconditional love. Loving Children to their Think of the father of the Prodigal Son - he did not even wait for Loving Mother.......................34 of the Holy Spirit, his son to say he was sorry, he was already hugging him. And mind They Are Grateful to one God, for ever and ever. you, you don’t have to be a father to say it…everyone at home Our Lady & Don Bosco.........34 deserves to be told they are loved…and mean it when you say it…oh, Thanks to Dear Opening Prayer how we’re waiting to hear it...and know it’s true! St. Dominic Savio..................35 Tuesday after Epiphany Fr. Ian Doulton sdb January 2016 2 Don Bosco’s Madonna January 2016 3 Don Bosco’s Madonna sessed… and she responded. God’s glory and the exact im- CEL SERIES Even though she at first greeted print of God’s very being…” THE RITUAL OF COFFEE DRINKING! him with a rifle, she gave him a (Hebr 1:1-3) and he came to THE RITUAL OF COFFEE DRINKING! gift and soon came to rejoice at mankind unarmed except with Fr. Erasto Fernandez, sss his presence. the total helplessness of a new ot long after the war stop- slowly put the rifle down and These humble tenuous begin- born child. He came seeking N ped in the Balkans, Fr. Mar- edged towards the kitchen. nings of a perilous journey to- shelter. “He was in the world, kovic of the now beleaguered wards an eventual loving emb- and the world came into being and battered city, Sarajevo, visit- The Age-old Coffee Ritual race were enacted through a rit- through him; yet the world did ed his home village. Occupying ual of coffee drinking. If the jour- not know him. He came to what the house in which his brother ney continues, it will ultimately was his own, and his own people used to live was now a fierce lead through the treacherous did not accept him. But to all Muslim woman. He had been terrain of forgiveness towards who received him, who believed warned by relatives and friends the meaningful communion of in his name, he gave power to not to go there because she bran- genuine covenantal love. It become children of God, who dished a rifle to protect her new- doesn’t call for much spiritual- were born, not of blood or of the gained house. He went anyway. ity to see in this simple story the will of the flesh or of the will of As he approached the house, he outlines of God’s humble man, but of God. And the Word saw the fierce looking woman Reappearing with two cups of approach to sinful humanity became flesh and moved into waiting for him, cigarette in her coffee a while later, the two erst- asking for a gracious and loving the neighbourhood, and we have mouth and rifle cocked. She while deadly enemies began to acceptance through a piece of seen his glory, the glory as of a literally barked as he neared the talk as they shared in the broken bread and a sip of shared father’s only son, full of grace front door, “Go away or I’ll shoot ancient ritual of hospitality, wine! and truth” (Jn 1:10-14). you.” “No, you won’t shoot me,” drinking coffee together. She In this simple beginning we said Fr. Markovic in a gentle but hesitantly yet fearlessly told him God’s Love Story recognize the pattern God al- firm voice, “you’ll make me a of her deep sense of loneliness, Estranged after aeons of sepa- ways followed since then in His cup of coffee!” In utter disbelief, of the house she had lost, of the ration following on Adam’s hei- dealings with humankind. It is she stared at him for a while, only son who never returned nous sin, from “long ago God He who takes the first steps to- then with trembling hands she from the battlefield. He listened spoke to our ancestors in many wards us, no matter how often with rapt attention as she and various ways by the prop- and how tragically we strayed poured out her woes, entering hets, but in these last days he has from His love. He comes, He into her feelings as humanely as spoken to us through a Son, comes, He ever comes … he could. And after sharing their whom he appointed heir of all begging for our loving accept- cup of coffee and the stories of things... He is the reflection of ance of His compassionate their lives, they parted on a note presence. The few times we of strange yet deep friendliness. graciously offer Him our humble When Fr. Markovic returned a hospitality, we are the ones who month later she was waiting for gain the most. him with a broad smile and she told him, “I rejoice at seeing you Comes Always to Give as much as if my son had retur- But God is always a giver and ned home.” Several meetings so instead of mankind offering followed during all of which Him hospitality, He offers us a they never spoke a word about new birth into God’s own family, forgiveness – and, as a matter of inviting us to celebrate our Cove- fact, it did not matter at all! He, nant with broken Bread and sha- the victim, came to her asking for red Cup.