Turin to Hong Kong, Taiwan, Macao and more: "It's
much more important to have the fire"
HONG KONG: 11th February 2006: If you were watching
the
opening of the Turin Winter Olympics last night, you would have noted
the way the exciting pageantry represented passion, dynamism and
Italianism. Almost in real time, fiery passion and dynamism (and
if we
can give 'Italianism' a more universal twist according to Don Bosco)
were being played out in the East, under the Angel of Arphaxad!
"We
are sons of a dreamer", the Rector Major told the provincial and his
councillors, and later, to Rectors who joined the group, he told them
to 'do in Mirabello what you see in Valdocco', Don Bosco's answer to
the bemused 23 year old Rua who wondered how on earth he as supposed to
be rector at that age. "Well", the Rector Major told them in Hong
Kong
this morning: "May all of our communities, your houses, be a replica of
Valdocco". In that sense then, the coincidence, or divine serendipity of events in Turin and those in
Hong Kong this February 10-11 was hard to miss.
In the first part of his meeting with the key
leaders-animators of
the Salesian community, the Provincial Council offered an overview of
the province, highlighting the important gains and occasional
difficulties. There have been important strategic changes in the
mission, a sense of greater vitality in schools, parishes and youth
centres, even if the schools face new and not easy challenges - finding
and paying lay principals being one of these. The Salesian Family
is
much more united, thinking and acting more as one. They speak of
"19
Salesian Family schools", for example, in Hong Kong. And there
are many good lay
people who love Don Bosco, many of them Past Pupils. Vocations
are
slowly moving, but there is great hope. In response the Rector
Major
made two main points: his great happiness in being part of these
celebrations, which he acknowledged were joyfully noisy, but far more
than firecrackers! He noted that it was about - and that he was
about
- firing up the hearts of the confreres, with the fire and passion of
Da
Mihi Animas. He also commented that he was happy to see their
renewal,
their striving for holiness and their deeper sharing in
community.
"It's much more important to have the fire. Motivation is the
most
important", he insisted, as he heard of their many significant efforts
despite age, burnout and daunting challenges ahead.
That's why he expanded this thinking to Rectors,
later in the
morning. "Your first task", he told them "is to maintain
well-motivated confreres. Vocation-wise, spiritual-wise,
pastoral-wise, keep them motivated". For this reason it is
important
to maintain family spirit, to reproduce the fatherliness and
friendliness of Don Bosco, so every confrere feels at home. And
it
all has one purpose - to set up a meaningful presence for
youngsters. He asked them again to recreate Don Bosco in
themselves, by giving God
primacy in life, by having Don Bosco's convictions about the importance
of young people and their education. He said much more to Rectors
than
we can really comment on here in a 'brief' news item, but clearly the
Rector Major's magisterium is often contained within precious moments
like this.
Later in the day - probably just as this item is
going out - he is
meeting with all CIN confreres and a number of other invited guests,
Bishop Zen included.
More this evening.
GLOSSARY
serendipity: finding something unexpected
and useful while searching for something else. Strange
coincidences.
______________
AustraLasia is an
email
service for
the Salesian Family of Asia Pacific. It also functions as an
agency
for ANS based in Rome. For RSS feeds, subscribe to www.bosconet.aust.com/rssala.xml
