INTERVIEW VIDA NUEVA 2025

On 25 March last, the General Chapter of the Salesians elected Fr Fabio Attard from Malta as their new Rector Major. In this interview, granted to the Salesian magazine Vida Nueva, he shares the challenges facing the Congregation.

What challenges did the General Chapter that elected you pass on to you?

Without a doubt, I believe that the greatest challenge we face is identity, but not only as Salesians, it is the challenge of the entire Church. In a fragmented society, where there seems to be no unity, addressing the question of identity opens up unique opportunities to understand reality and what we are called to be and to offer. Someone who is clear about his or her identity can establish a dynamic dialogue with a reality that questions their spirituality. When we Salesians contemplate Don Bosco, we say that he lived the grace of unity, that he was a profoundly human and profoundly holy man who lived an incarnated spirituality. Living in this way helps us to read and respond to the challenges we face. The Chapter was a call to be ‘passionate about Jesus Christ’ and ‘passionate about young people ’ to walk together in a world where there is a different perception of faith compared to the past, but the thirst for meaning, the thirst for people's spirituality, does not change. Don Bosco told us that everyone, especially young people, has a point of access, even if it can sometimes be very hidden by their negative experiences.

The message that Pope Francis sent to the Chapter, in addition to identity, pointed out the challenge of interculturalism. How can this be lived in the largest congregation in the world?

Indeed, we have to combine identity with interculturalism. Our charism comes from the Spirit and this speaks to the human and is translated into cultural categories; in the same way that the Gospel, when it encounters cultures, is a source of light which sheds light on them, makes them grow, makes the good in them mature. In the same way, our own elements such as the preventive system, pastoral charity with its pedagogical intelligence are present in the whole world and in all cultures. We have the responsibility to develop this charism, that is not ours but is the action of the spirit through the figure of Don Bosco that comes to us in Christian environments but also to others, non-believers or agnostics. I have seen that, like the Salesian charism, it is a charism that crosses cultural borders. However, it is a challenge for communities with Salesians from various parts of the world to find their charismatic identity, to live it with joy, with enthusiasm and to be able to offer it. But multiculturalism is also found in many classrooms in European schools, where there are students of 30 or 40 nationalities, and we have to help them discover convergences and help them to walk together and not create separate ghettos. This is also a multicultural experience around the Salesian charism.

And with the Salesian congregation like this, how is the vocational crisis being experienced?

The vocational crisis is an important question that must also be interpreted from the perspective of the evolution of culture itself. In Europe we have seen that secularisation has shown us that although it has been culturally Christian, there was not necessarily a personal choice of faith; we have had Christianity, but not necessarily Christians. This has left us with a creative minority that is small in numbers but not in quality. It is the creative minority of which Benedict XVI spoke. They are the people who are very clear about their call, who assume it with their whole personality. And, on the subject of vocations, as Cardinal André Vingt-Trois of Paris said years ago, the relationship between vocations and those who practise is still the same: before, out of 100 people who practised, there were 10 vocations, now out of ten we have one. Beyond this, Vatican II has prepared us to see the Church as a believing community where each one has his responsibility, feels the commitment he needs to live. For this reason, we have a lay commitment that was not there earlier, with people with a very deep knowledge of the charism and a desire to live their mission with all their strength. This forces us to see how pastoral processes are no longer products that are sold, but experiences that are proposed. Moreover, in Europe there is an upturn in the number of adult baptisms. As Pope Francis said, we are not only in a change of era, but an era of changes in which the interpretative keys that we had yesterday do not work today. And here we must continue to open doors and offer opportunities.

A war mission

Since your first public interventions, you have remembered the Salesians in war-torn territories. What is the testimony of these brothers and sisters?

The increase in violence is not just a growing sociological phenomenon. Now, as superior, I have a much greater responsibility towards these confreres, of whom there are many, who live in the midst of conflicts, wars, terrorism or gang violence. When I talk to them they tell me: ‘we don't need anything, we only ask that the congregation continues to accompany us because we need affection, accompaniment and prayer. Human and spiritual closeness is what we need, because we are not thinking of withdrawing’ they say. These witnesses in the pastoral field are the modern martyrs. From the very beginning, the Salesians in Ukraine were clear that the congregation is there to work for young people, especially when there are difficulties, and to do so with pastoral creativity in order to respond to new demands, such as psychological support or the reception of those who have nowhere to sleep and eat because someone has lost their family.

And how do you feel  about this responsibility?

Knowing that I can do little materially speaking, I strive in this sense of closeness, fraternity, continuous prayer and personal interest. They are small signs but they are eloquent; they don't make a noise but they leave a strong impact because they come from the depths of the heart and they reach out to it. I keep in touch with these confreres and they know that when they need me they can call me because now for these people I am not just Fabio, I am the successor of Don Bosco. And then there is another, more direct accompaniment from the Provinces themselves.

How do you see yourself when you consider that you are not so much the successor of Cardinal Fernández Artime but of Don Bosco. What personal demands does it make on you?

I was able to have my photo taken in front of the altar of Don Bosco when elected, together with the two previous predecessors. It was a beautiful moment for me, to be with those whom I still call ‘Rector Major’ and they call me ‘Rector Major’. So I feel not only that there is unity, but that we experience the same love. It is a simple thing, but I feel it is too big. I still need time to get used to the idea of this mission that transcends human elements. I will do what I can and I ask the confreres to pray for the Lord to work in me and through me.

Coming to the moment of your election, what might it have meant for the Chapter members to look beyond their assembly for their new superior general?

This election was a real surprise, with so many miles to cover to arrive there. It came at a time in my life when I am not easily impressed, but there is no explanation for when I received the call from the Chapter. On the journey from Rome to Turin, I was thinking about what the Lord was asking of me through my confreres. But I felt loved, accompanied and I interpreted this as meaning that the Chapter had great freedom in their choice and in sharing the situations that the congregation needs. It may also be that we are in a new moment of continuing to deepen discernment, in tune with synodality, in reflecting  before the Spirit. Listening and a discernment, the methodology used in the Chapter in line with the last Synod, which must continue as a paradigm of governance. For years now, we have had a Salesian synodality platform in the form of the educative and pastoral community, which brings Salesians together with all the main actors of the mission. For us, pastoral action is always the educative and pastoral project.

Encouraging lay confreres

At the Chapter, a ‘historic milestone’ was passed with the experimental approval of lay Salesians - the so-called coadjutors or brothers in our terminology - to become local superiors. Can this be a testimony to synodality?

If we look at Don Bosco, who had a very deep insight into this issue, he wanted extern Salesians. Now we have recovered this theme that Pope Francis put before us. We have a whole tradition that places the priestly dimension alongside government, and this has generated a great diversity of opinions that will help us to continue reflecting over the next six years. The sense of community itself is also changing, and we have educative and pastoral communities where in some contexts there are people of various beliefs who are in tune with Don Bosco. From experience, we are going to gradually read and interpret and accompany this possibility of brothers being able to be community superiors.

The Chapter ended with a Jubilee pilgrimage. Are there reasons for hope in today's young people?

It was providential because, initially, the Chapter was supposed to take place in 2026. We Salesians are known for finding a way out when we find ourselves in emergency situations. The final document is very positive, and we have been permeated by this invitation to the hope of the Jubilee. Moreover, we are celebrating the 150th anniversary of the sending of the first missionary expedition by Don Bosco and we see that there are still many open frontiers. Hope is not waiting for what no longer exists, it is the tension of the ‘already but not yet’, which expresses that to the extent that we are rooted in what exists, we must be able to look to the future without getting lost, because we await the future with the same joy that we saw the present. This is an element of the wisdom of the educator who has the capacity to see the adult of 30 in a 15-year-old. This must be passed on to young people, planting seeds of hope in them today, because they are fertile ground if we offer them a view of the future based on what is already there now, so that they feel that they have enormous potential. This is living pastoral charity and doing it with pedagogical intelligence.