The comfort of a Christian friendship

When two saints meet often a deep relationship is created between them, based on the fact that both live life under the special light of the will of God and are stirred in unison by His way, strange to us, of thinking and acting.
But it is also interesting to note that such a firm orientation toward God often gives rise to a human friendship fruitful for both. They, perhaps unwittingly, support each other on the path of life, helping to find out what God wants from them.
This was certainly true for Cardinal Andrea Carlo Ferrari, and Monsignor Guido Maria Conforti, his seminary student and later, like him, a bishop of the Italian Church. Two very different characters, but precisely because of that, capable of profound reciprocity and true union for the good of the people of God entrusted to them.
On the occasion of the canonization of Bishop Conforti, we can humanly say that without the influence of Ferrari from his early youth, Guido Conforti probably would not have been one of the most significant bishops of the Italian Church in the early nineteenth century and maybe would not have become a saint.