Sent to the young
in communities
following Christ
THOSE TO WHOM OUR MISSION IS DIRECTED
"He saw a great throng, and had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things" (Mk 6,34).
26. The Lord made clear to Don Bosco that he was to direct his mission first and foremost to the young, especially to those who are poorer.
We are called to the same mission and are aware of its supreme importance: young people are at the age when they must make basic life-choices which affect the future of society and of the Church.
With Don Bosco we reaffirm our preference for the young who are "poor, abandoned and in danger",1 those who have greater need of love and evangelization, and we work especially in areas of greatest poverty.
27. Young people from poor areas who are looking for work, and young workers in general, often encounter difficulties and easily become victims of injustice.
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Making the concern of Don Bosco our own, we go to them to prepare them to take their place with dignity in society and in the Church and to alert them to the role they must play in the christian transformation of social life.
Young people called to serve the Church
28. To meet the needs of his people the Lord continually calls some to follow him, and enriches them with a variety of gifts in the service of the Kingdom.
We are convinced that many young people are rich in spiritual potential and give indications of an apostolic vocation.
We help them to discover, accept and develop the gift of a lay, consecrated or priestly vocation, for the benefit of the whole Church and of the Salesian Family.
With equal zeal we nurture adult vocations.
29. Our priority commitment to young people who are poor fits in well with pastoral involvement among poor people in general.
We recognize the gospel values which they stand for, and the need they have of support in their efforts at human advancement and growth in the faith. Hence we support them by "all the means that Christian charity suggests".1
We also give our attention to the lay people responsible for evangelization of their local area, and to the family where different generations come together2 and build the future of mankind.
30. People still awaiting the gospel message were the special object of Don Bosco's concern and apostolic effort. They continue to stimulate our zeal and keep it alive. We look upon missionary work as an essential feature of our Congregation.
Through our missionary activity we carry out a patient work of evangelization by founding the Church within a group of people.1 This work mobilizes all the educational and pastoral means proper to our charism.
Following the example of the Son of God, who made himself in all things like his fellow men, the Salesian missionary makes his own the values of these people and shares their hopes and anxieties.2
OUR PASTORAL EDUCATIONAL SERVICE
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release (o the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." (Lk 4,18-19)
31. Our mission is a sharing in that of the Church, which brings about the saving design of God, the coming of His Kingdom, by bringing to men the message of the Gospel, which is closely tied in with the development of the temporal order.1
We educate and evangelize according to a plan for the total well-being of man directed to Christ, the perfect Man.2 Faithful to the intentions of our Founder, our purpose is to form "upright citizens and good Christians".3
32. As educators we work together with our young people to bring all their talents and aptitudes to full maturity.
According to circumstances we share our food with them and further their trade skills and cultural advancement.
Always and in every case we help them to be open to truth and to develop in themselves a responsible freedom. To this end we commit ourselves to inculcating in them a convinced appreciation of true values which will lead them to a life of dialogue and service.
Social and collective development
33. Don Bosco saw clearly the social implications of his work.
We labour in economically depressed areas and for poor youth. We collaborate with them, educating them to a sense of moral, professional and social responsibility. In this way we contribute to the development of both people and environment.
We share in a way appropriate to religious in the witness and commitment of the Church to justice and peace. While not getting involved in ideologies or party politics, we reject everything that encourages deprivation, injustice and violence. We cooperate with all who are trying to build a society more worthy of man's dignity.
The advancement to which we dedicate ourselves in the spirit of the Gospel makes tangible the love of Christ which makes men free, and is a sign that the Kingdom of God is among us.
34. "This Society had its beginning in a simple catechism lesson."1 For us too evangelizing and catechizing are the fundamental characteristics of our mission.
Like Don Bosco, we are all called to be educators to the faith at every opportunity. Our highest knowledge therefore is to know Jesus Christ, and our greatest delight is to reveal to all people the unfathomable riches of his mystery.2
We walk side by side with the young so as to lead them to the risen Lord, and so discover in him and in his Gospel the deepest meaning of their own existence, and thus grow into new men.
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The Virgin Mary is present in this process as a mother. We make her known and loved as the one who believed,3 who helps and who infuses hope.
Introduction to ecclesial life
35. We introduce the young to the experience of ecclesial life by bringing them into a faith community and helping them to take part in it.
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To this end we promote and animate groups and movements for formation and apostolic and social action. In these the young people grow in the awareness of their own responsibilities and learn to give their irreplaceable contribution to the transformation of the world and to the life of the Church, and so become themselves the "first apostles of the young, in direct contact with them".1
Introduction to liturgical life
36. We introduce the young to a conscious and active participation in the Church’s liturgy, the summit and source of all Christian life.1
With them we celebrate the encounter with Christ in word, prayer and sacraments.
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The Eucharist and the sacrament of Reconciliation, celebrated with care are means of exceptional value for education to Christian liberty, to conversion of heart and to a spirit of sharing and service in the ecclesial community.
37. We educate the young to develop their own human and baptismal vocation by a daily life progressively inspired and unified by the Gospel.
The family atmosphere of welcome and of faith, created by the witness of a community which gives of itself with joy, is the most efficacious setting for the discovery and guidance of vocations.
This work of collaboration with God's design, the crown of all our educational and pastoral activity, is sustained by prayer and personal contact, above all in spiritual direction.
The preventive system in our mission
38. Don Bosco has handed on to us his Preventive System as a means for carrying out our educational and pastoral service.
"This system is based entirely on reason, religion and loving kindness."1 Instead of constraint, it appeals to the resources of intelligence, love and the desire for God, which everyone has in the depths of his being.
It brings together educators and youngsters in a family experience of trust and dialogue.
Imitating God's patience, we encounter the young at their present stage of freedom. We then accompany them, so that they may develop solid convictions and gradually assume the responsibility for the delicate process of their growth as human beings and as men of faith.
Assistance as an attitude and method
39. The practice of the preventive system demands a fundamental disposition on our part: an empathy with the young and a willingness to be with them: "Here in your midst I feel completely at home; for me, living means being here with you."1
We are actively present among youth in brotherly friendship, helping them in their efforts to grow in what is good, and encouraging them to cast off every form of slavery, so that their weakness may not be overcome by evil.
This presence affords us a true understanding of the world of the young and unites us with them in all the healthy aspects of their restless energy.
CRITERIA FOR SALESIAN ACTIVITY
"For though I am free from all men, I have made myself a slave to all, that I might win the more... To the weak I became weak, that I might win the weak; I have become all things to all men, that I might by all means save some." (1 Cor 9,19.22)
Don Bosco’s Oratory a permanent criterion
40. Don Bosco lived a pastoral experience in his first Oratory which serves as a model; it was for the youngsters a home that welcomed, a parish that evangelized, a school that prepared them for life, and a playground where friends could meet and enjoy themselves.
As we carry out our mission today, the Valdocco experience is still the lasting criterion for discernment and renewal in all our activities and works.
Inspirational criteria for our activity and works
41. Our apostolic activity is carried out in a variety of ways, which depend in the first place upon the actual needs of those for whom we are working.
We give practical expression to the redeeming love of Christ by organizing activities and works of an educational and pastoral nature designed to meet the needs of the neighbourhood and of the Church. Sensitive to the signs of the times and with initiative and continual flexibility we evaluate these activities, renew them and create new ones.
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The education and evangelization of many young people, especially among the very poor, means that we have to go to them where they are to be found, and provide adequate forms of service in the context of their own life style.
42. We carry out our mission chiefly in such works and activities as make possible the human and christian education of the young, such as oratories and youth centres, schools and technical institutes, boarding establishments and houses for young people in difficulties.
In parishes and mission residences we contribute to the spreading of the Gospel and to the advancement of the people. We collaborate in the pastoral programme of the particular Church out of the riches of our specific vocation.
In specialized centres we make available our pedagogical and catechetical expertise in the service of the young,
In retreat houses we provide for the Christian formation of groups, especially of young people.
We dedicate ourselves also to every other kind of work which has as its scope the salvation of the young.
43. We work in the social communication sector. This is a significant field of activity,1 which constitutes one of the apostolic priorities of the Salesian mission.
Our Founder had an instinctive grasp of the value of this means of mass education, which creates culture and spreads patterns of life; he showed great originality in the apostolic undertakings which he initiated to defend and sustain the faith of the people.
Following his example we utilize as God's gift the great possibilities which social communication offers us for education and evangelization.
THOSE WHO SHARE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE MISSION
"He who plants and he who waters are equal, and each shall receive his wages according to his labour. For we are God's fellow workers, you are God's field, God's building." (1 Cor 3,8-9)
The mission is given to the community
44. The apostolic mandate which the Church entrusts to us is taken up and put into effect in the first place by the provincial and local communities. The members have complementary functions and each one of their tasks is important. They are aware that pastoral objectives are achieved through unity and joint brotherly responsibility.
The provincial and the rector, as promoters of dialogue and teamwork, guide the community in pastoral discernment, so that it may accomplish its apostolic plan in unity and fidelity.
Common and complementary responsibilities
45. Each of us is responsible for the common mission, and participates in it with the richness of his own personal gifts and with the lay and priestly characteristics of the one Salesian vocation.
The Salesian brother brings to every field of education and pastoral activity the specific qualities of his lay status, which make him in a particular way a witness to God’s Kingdom in the world, close as he is to the young and to the realities of working life.
The Salesian priest or deacon brings to the common work of promoting human development and of educating in the faith the specific quality of his ministry, which makes him a sign of Christ the Good Shepherd, especially by preaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments.
The significant and complementary presence of clerical and lay Salesians in the community constitutes an essential element of its makeup and of its apostolic completeness.
46. The family spirit and the dynamic drive which is characteristic of our mission among young people make particularly important the contribution of young Salesians in the apostolate.
They are closer to the rising generations; they can provide inspiration and enthusiasm; they are ready to try new solutions.
The community, by encouraging and guiding this generosity, helps them to mature as religious and apostles.
The educative community and lay people associated with our work
47. We bring about in our works the educative and pastoral community which involves young people and adults, parents and educators, in a family atmosphere, so that it can become a living experience of Church and a revelation of God’s plan for us.
In this community lay people associated with our work make a contribution all their own, because of their experience and pattern of life.
We welcome and encourage their collaboration, and we give them the opportunity to get a deeper knowledge of the Salesian spirit and the practice of the preventive system.
We foster the spiritual growth of each of them, and to those who may be so inclined we suggest a closer sharing of our mission in the Salesian Family.
Solidarity with the particular Church
48. The community lives and expresses its apostolic commitment within the particular Church. We become part of its pastoral action which has the Bishop at its head1 and the directives of the Bishops’ Conference as a springboard for action on a wider scale.
We offer the particular Church the contribution of our work and Salesian pedagogy, and we receive from it direction and support.
To forge more systematic links we share initiatives with other groups belonging to the Salesian Family and with other religious institutes.
We are ready to cooperate with civil organizations working in the fields of education and social development.