Homily for Friday of 14th Week of Ordinary Time

Homily for Friday
14th Week of Ordinary Time

July 8, 2022
Matt 10: 16-23
Provincial House, New Rochelle

Jesus cautions us against trusting in human beings:  “beware of men, for they will hand you over to courts” (Matt 10:17).  Rely, instead, on God, who will supply you with the Holy Spirit (10:20).

Don Bosco taught us that.  Altho he turned readily to powerful and wealthy people in the Church and in civil society, he always put God first.  He was single-minded.  He was a priest always, equally in the royal palace and in the homes of the poor.  As we know, he got badly burned by pushing his friend Gastaldi’s promotion too far—a case of trusting in man—and that man did indeed hand him over to court, an ecclesiastical one.

Hearing a coachman's confession

(from Ceria's Don Bosco, illus. by Galizzi)

But generally our Founder was “shrewd as a serpent and simple as a dove” (10:16)—shrewd in a good sense in his dealings with every manner of person:  youngster, cleric, bureaucrat, noble; and simple in his personal habits, his prayer, his straightforward manner, his pursuit of holiness.  He was always ready to speak the Gospel message as prompted by the Holy Spirit:  to kids on the street, to coachmen, to those searching his house, to crowds in Paris.  In his inmost being, God taught him wisdom (Ps 51:8), so that his mouth and his pen ever proclaimed God’s praise (51:17).

Don Bosco remains always for us a model of life and of pastoral practice, demonstrating life as a mystic of the Spirit.  “Let him who is wise understand these things; let him who is prudent know them” (Hos 14:10).