We must be Holy

Let us open a new Divine world to many people; let us humbly and with charitable gentleness understand the little ones, the poor and the humble.

We want to boil over with faith and charity.

We want to be saints, alive for others but dead to ourselves.

Every word of ours must be a breath of heaven, heaven that is wide open; our words must be such that everyone feels the flame that burns in our heart and the light of our inner tire. God and Christ must be found in them.

Our devotion must not leave people cold and wearied, as it must be truly alive and full of Christ.

 

To follow in the footsteps of Jesus right up to Calvary, and then to go up on to the Cross with him or die of love with him and for him at the foot of the Cross.

To thirst for martyrdom.

To serve the Son of Man in men and women.

To win others over for God and to hold on to them, we must first live an intense life of God in ourselves, and have within us an unconquerable faith and a noble ideal which must be a brightly burning flame. We must renounce ourselves for others. Our lives must be on lire with an ideal and a sacred love that is ever stronger.

No one who would obey two masters, the senses and the spirit, can ever find the secret of winning souls.

We must pronounce words and perform works that live on after us.

We must mortify ourselves in secret and in silence.

Follow your vocation and remain faithful to your vows.

Let us delight in being able to carry out the humblest of domestic tasks.

We must be holy but we must become so saintly that our holiness is not just for the veneration of the faithful', it must not remain within the confines of the Church. Instead it must go out and radiate such a splendour of light in society, such a life of love of God and of mankind, as to make us not just the saints of the Church, but the saints of the people and of the welfare of the community.

We must be such a deep vein of mystic spirituality as to penetrate all the social strata: active and contemplative spirits; ‘servants of Christ and the poor.'

Do not give yourselves up to the vanity of letters; do not become puffed up with the things of the world.

Communicate with your brothers only so as to edify them', communicate with others only to spread the goodness of the Lord:

l. to love Christ in everyone

2. to serve Christ in the poor

3. to renew Christ in ourselves and to restore everything in Christ

4. always save, save everyone, save whatever the cost, with a redeeming passion and redeeming sacrifice.

Great souls and great and generous hearts, strong and free Christian consciences that will feel their mission of truth, of faith, of noble hopes, and of holy love for God and for mankind, and who, in the light of a a singularly great faith, a faith that is truly in Divine Providence, will walk without stain and without fear, through fire and water and even through the mud of all the hypocrisy, wickedness and licentiousness.

Let us bring with us and indeed within us the Divine treasure of that Charity which is God. Although we have to go among the people, let us keep within our hearts that heavenly silence which no worldly noise can break, and the inviolate cell of the humble knowledge of ourselves, where the soul speaks with the angels and with Christ Our Lord.

Time that has gone by is no longer ours', we cannot be sure to have the time that is to come. All we have therefore is this moment of present time, nothing more.

 We will not be spared the scandals and the false morality of the scribes and the pharisees, nor the malicious insinuations, nor the calumnies and persecutions. But, my sons, we should not have the time to turn our head and look at the plough' as our mission of charity pushes us forward and presses us, since our love for our neighbour burns us, because the burning, Divine tire of Christ consumes us.

We are intoxicated with charity; we are the fools of the Cross of Jesus Christ.

Above all by a life that is humble, holy and full of goodness we must teach the little ones and the poor to follow the path of God. We must live in a brilliant sphere inebriated with the light and the Divine love of Christ and of the poor and of the heavenly dew, like the lark that rises, singing, in the sun.

May our meals be like the ancient Christian meals of fellowship.

Souls! Souls!

To have a great heart and a Divine madness for souls!

Jesus is never sown in vain in the hearts of young people

 Most of the young people who came into contact with Don Orione were marked in a positive way for the whole of their lives by him.  Many years later, all over the world, they would have the fondest and most favourable memory of their Father… Don Orione speaks to us about it in a letter to his “Former Pupils.” One of the happiest surprises he had in Latin America was, in fact, that of meeting, in those far off lands, a great number of his former pupils who showed the utmost affection for him.  And their gratitude as well. Don Orione, who has always remained a “friend, father and confessor” to them, invites them to keep on with the good work. He is happy to note once more that “Jesus is never sown in vain in the hearts of young people.”

Souls and Souls!

Buenos Aires, 7 September 1935

To my dearest and unforgettable Former Pupils,

You cannot imagine, my Dearest Friends, how frequently I think of you, with all the old, unchangeable affection!

From this far off land, I send the greetings of dozens of your one-time companions, former Pupils like you, who, in this hospitable Argentina, have kept high and honoured the name of Italy, so proud they are to have been educated in our Schools.

Since I arrived they have been surrounding me with so much love and so much gratitude that more than once I have felt emotional to the point of tears.

Many have even come from the central part of Argentina and further still, bringing me their children to be blessed.  When they first saw me they could not prevent themselves from crying for joy, as if they had seen their father or their mother.

Imagine, my dear Former Pupils, that it is forty years since I have seen some of them, from the time I was starting…  After many, many years in which we had not seen each other, I would never have thought that I could have been remembered so well and loved so much!

Ah, I am more and more convinced that we never sow or plough Jesus Christ in vain in the hearts of children and young people.

Even if, at a certain time in our lives, it may sometimes seem that Christ is still in the tomb, His death was such that He will always, sooner or later but always, rise again.

From time to time three or four of them happen to meet me here, as well as some from the first Oratory, in the Bishop’s garden.  They are now grown men and more than grey haired.

They greet each other and come to see me as if they were coming home to their old father’s house.

And they pour their hearts out, telling me things in confidence, talking about their joys and sorrows and even – should I say it? – even their sins!  Thus I act as a friend, father and confessor to them!

And they go away happy, leaving such a great contentment in my heart, “that no-one who has not experienced it can understand.”

I wanted nothing more than to know that they were always mindful, always grateful and always in holy fear of God, living in the midst of this big world, where there is a bit of everything, living moral lives, fulfilling their duties, giving good example to their children.

If it is God’s will that I return to you, I would like for us all to meet together in order to consolidate and strengthen ever more the sacred bond that unites us, and to increase our sphere of good works.  And you will certainly all feel with me a most earnest desire to cooperate in that renewal of Christian life, “Renewing all things in Christ,” by which the individual, the family and society can expect a restoration of the social order.  Remember that we are and want to be your most sincere and affectionate friends.

Goodbye, dearest Former Pupils.  May God bless you!  Don Orione thinks about you constantly, and prays for you and for your families.

I embrace you all in spirit and send you my most abundant blessing, both for you and for your families!

Yours, Don Orione