Don Bosco, Still Teaching in the Hallway - Catholic Insight

On joy, presence, young love, and the quiet holiness of Catholic education
There’s a particular kind of sound you only hear in a school: a quick burst of laughter that tries to hide itself, the shuffle of sneakers between classes, the rhythmic thud of lockers, and the sudden hush when a student realizes you’re closer than they thought. Every day in a Salesian school, that soundscape becomes a kind of living text—one you learn to “read” the way Don Bosco read the streets of Turin: with patience, attention, and a stubborn hope.
On January 31, the Church celebrates St. John Bosco, priest, educator, and father to the young—especially those whom society was already prepared to lose. Don Bosco’s holiness didn’t grow in a quiet corner. It grew in the noise of the streets, where boys carried hunger, restlessness, humor, and heartbreak all at once. He built what he called the Oratory—not merely a religious program, but a home: a place where prayer and play, formation and friendship, discipline …