Rector Major’s Visit to South Asia 2006

1-9 February 2006: Sri Lanka & South India

The Rector Major’s South Asia Visit of 2006 was, like the one of 2005, hectic, brief and colourful. This rapid 9-day visit took him first to Sri Lanka where he presided over the Golden Jubilee celebrations of Salesian presence on the island, and then to the provinces of Chennai, Tiruchy, Bangalore and Hyderabad in South India. On 5 February, in Thanjavur, he presided over the solemn conclusion of the Centenary Celebrations of Salesian presence in India. The province of Mumbai and the Vice Provinces of the Konkan and Myanmar are the only ones of the South Asia region yet to be visited by Fr Chávez.

Sri Lanka

1-2 February 2006

On arrival at Colombo airport in the morning of 1 February, the Rector Major Fr. Pascual Chávez was received by Fr. Humer Pinto, Superior of the Vice-Province, and a number of confreres and past pupils. The past pupils escorted him with a big motorcade from the airport to the Provincial House at Dungalpitiya. At the Provincial House, Fr. Chávez was welcomed by a huge gathering of flag-waving youngsters and professional Kandian Dancers in their traditional costumes displaying their acrobatic skills.

In a busy first day in Sri Lanka for the Golden Jubilee of Salesian presence there, the Rector Major made an unscheduled visit to Bosco Sevana, a community much appreciated in Sri Lanka because it takes in youngsters who have been abused. The boys prepared some impromptu songs for the Rector Major who discovered something rather special about this group -- they were able to give him the names of all Rector Majors since Don Bosco! His comment was that not even Salesian novices at times could remember the list as well as these boys did. The boys come from various religious and language backgrounds and offer an example of religious harmony for a country that is struggling to discover the secret to this harmony.

Earlier in the afternoon, the Rector Major blessed a new multipurpose hall at the Provincial House in Dungalpitiya. The 22x36-metre building was sponsored by the Banco di Credito Cooperativo di Roma and was packed with 2,500 young people, all eager to meet the ninth successor of Don Bosco. The construction was supervised by VIS, the Rome-based Salesian Volunteer Service. Amongst other important parts of this ceremony was the distribution, by the Rector Major, of boats, outboard motors and fishing nets to people afflicted by the Tsunami, many of whom were gathered in the hall for the occasion.

On 2 February, the Rector Major blessed a Tsunami Village called Bosco Pura, a complex of 204 apartments for 204 families, begun shortly after the Tsunami and supported financially by the Italian Government through its Protezione Civile arm. The project was overseen, however, by VIS.

Later in the day, the Rector Major celebrated Mass at the Shrine of Mary Help of Christians in Negombo, attended by confreres and many members of the Salesian Family. New Cooperators and members of ADMA (Association of the Clients of Mary Help of Christians), both groups founded by Don Bosco himself, made their Promise. The Rector Major tied his homily to the realities he had been involved in during the day, namely the Tsunami response, and the Feast of the Presentation. "I have to say that I feel intensely proud", he said, "of your immense compassion and solicitude in bringing relief to those who had suffered the dramatic experience of nature's brute force and its enormous sequel of death and devastation". He pointed out to his listeners that the Feast of the Presentation is a bridge between Christmas and Easter, drawing on the Eastern tradition of the feast as a moment of 'encounter'. He told them that his prayer was for Mary to present each of them, their communities, to the Lord as she had presented Jesus in the Temple to old Simeon, that they be filled with passion for God and passion for humanity, to be a transfiguring presence of God in Sri Lanka, living totally consecrated to him and fully vowed on behalf of the young.

The Rector Major bade farewell to Sri Lanka in the morning of 3 February and left for Chennai along with Fr. Joaquim D’Souza, Fr. Humer Pinto and several other Salesians from Sri Lanka to take part in the concluding celebrations of the Centenary of Salesian Presence in India.