Stony Point: Focus on the Easter Connection & Don Bosco

By Fr. Steve Shafran, SDB

(Stony Point, NY – April 17) – Happy Easter! He is Risen! The Marian Shrine Chapel is blessed to have a clear reminder of how important Easter Sunday and our Salesian history align. The Risen Christ powerfully emblazoned on a white cross emanating from a blue stained glass window is now framed by stone. Hope and life come to the faithful in a concrete way, entombed no longer, but free.

Don Bosco began the Oratory in the humble beginnings of the Pinardi shed on Easter Sunday. The Resurrection mosaic in the Pinardi Chapel at Valdocco records this fact of our history. However, there is a greater depth to this reality. It is the lived experience of hope and life that our founder envisioned for poor and abandoned youth that resonates today through our Salesian Family. We are also proud that St. John Bosco was canonized on Easter Sunday, a validation that our Salesian spirituality and educational approach are rooted in the Good Shepherd and a true path of holiness.

The photo captures the chapel sanctuary at Easter on Divine Mercy Sunday. Most of the sanctuary work and painting of the interior have been completed. We now look forward to the creation of the color-etched windows of Salesian and Youth saints that will grace the 24 windows, these are real models of holiness in the Salesian style. Alleluia!

To be continued