Hajja Salesjana April-June 2020

15 H AJJA S ALESJANA 3. In which way are you part of the Salesian Family? Thankfully I am a perpetually professed Salesian lay brother, for the past eleven years assigned to Our Lady of Porto Salvo Church and Oratory in Senglea. I also daily distribute Holy Communion to the sick and the elderly in their homes and try to visit the sick in hospital whenever time and other duties allow. Putting my hands to anything that has to do with carpentry and doing light maintenance around the place, thankfully at my age, keeps me quite active too. 5. Who is Don Bosco for you and what strikes you most about him? For me Don Bosco is the noblest example of God’s love in practice in this world. A zealous and untiring aspostle, he never shirked sacrifice to whatever extent. His life was a continuous chain of pure love in action at all costs. We all know very well that practically and literally he wore himself out for love of God and youth. That is how he left this world, worn out at 72. True to his word, “We will rest in Heaven.” I remember the day when I came face to face with a rather old priest and friend of mine walking down the steps of our St. Patrick’s School in Sliema, when all of a sudden out of the blues, he exclaimed, “What a giant of a saint you Salesians have!” Would have thanked him for the compliment if only he did not leave me gaping. But my feeling at that moment, well I just could not be thankful enough for being a son, unworthy as I am, in this big, happy family Don Bosco founded. What message would you like to pass on to the readers of Óajja Salesjana? Always invoke Jesus to increase your faith, praying in the words of the distressed father of the boy possessed by a dumb spirit, “Jesus I believe. Help my unbelief!” (Mk. 9, 24). Like Don Bosco, be always a person with a big heart for all. Never let that smile fade from your face, even through suffering; Jesus and Mary stand by you and always remember that ‘The road to a friend’s house is never too long!’ 6. 4. Is there a phrase or a sentence from Don Bosco that inspires you in your life? How does one single out a fruit from Don Bosco’s vast orchard of God-inspired wisdom? It is all so very good and practical. In any case, one of Don Bosco’s gems reads: “Let yourself be guided by reason and not by passion.”