JANUARY 6

“One morning after breakfast while Don Bosco was in the refectory, several of us had gathered around him as usual. He was looking at us with his face lit up, with that loving smile of his, telling us that he knew the interior of our hearts, when suddenly a student from a place near the Oratory despising that which he though impossible, interrupted saying: ‘if that is so, tell me my thoughts!’ Don Bosco made him come near and spoke to him in an undertone. What he said we do not know, but the fact remains that he remained confused and ashamed and did not dare to answer a word. I myself was present. 

“About two years ago a fellow theology student went with a certain religious gentleman to a village in the country about ten miles distant from Turin. On his return he came to confession to Don Bosco and afterwards he confided this to me saying, ‘I must tell you a fine thing that happened to me. Before coming to Turin, I had a sin on my conscience, and being shamed to accuse myself of it to Don Bosco, I confessed it to the parish priest of the place where I was. Then after a few days I went to confession to Don Bosco and after my confession he told me, ‘look here I know quite well that you did so and so’ (and he told me my sin)’ ‘I’ – continued my companion – ‘was stupefied and I have learnt at my own cost that when you commit some grave sin it is not worthwhile confessing it to others: Don Bosco knows it whether you tell him or not.” Thus writes Fr. Turhi but he is not far from being the only one who has borne such testimony to the deeds of Don Bosco. 

Fr. John Garino, a well-known professor, wrote as follows: ‘One winter morning in the year 1858 or 1859 a crowd of us were standing around Don Bosco who was taking a little coffee. We were all packed very tightly, some in front sitting on the long table at the head of which he sat, some at his side, others behind him. 

‘All were laughing and joking familiarly but with respect as was the custom of good children who love their father. After a time one began to speak how Don Bosco saw into the future, of how he knew when someone would die, and so on. On that same morning and in the same place I remember how Don Bosco had whispered into the ear of certain boys certain secrets of theirs which greatly stupefied them. A boy named Evaristo C…was sitting on a small bench near his right hand.’ He was a rather lively youngster and by no means one of the most exemplary. 

He was continually laughing at the words and acts of Don Bosco and his companions, but in such a scornful way that he clearly showed what he though of such things. Suddenly he said: ‘Don Bosco, I don’t believe you can read hidden things. Tell me something,’ thus provoking Don Bosco to tell some secret of his life. Don Bosco took him at his word and, bending, whispered some words in his ear which e could not hear. After that he never dared to say that Don Bosco did not know the secrets of one’s heart