1214 Sisters Announcers of the Lord: when SAL really means Salesian
austraLasia 1214
Sisters Announcers of the Lord: when SAL really means
Salesian.
ROME: 28 July 2005 -- The Salesian Family has grown
by
one more member group, though for many who have known the Sisters
Announcers of the
Lord
in China Province, they have always been part of the Salesian
Family. They were, after all, the result of the Spirit moving
through
the saintly Bishop Versiglia, who asked Fr Ignazio Canazei to draft a
set of Constitutions which would reflect Don Bosco on the one hand, and
St. Therese Lisieux, patroness of the Missions, on the other.
Today, in Rome, the usual path to formal recognition as
members of
the Salesian Family came to fruition. The General Council,
according
to guidelines set out in ASC 304 in 1982 and finally established
in
ACG 363 in 1989 as normative, recognised not only the various required
aspects:
ecclesial recognition, lived experience of the Salesian vocation,
growth both internal and in terms of spread, autonomy, but also the
significance of this moment as the Salesian presence prepares to
celebrate its China centenary.
By no means a large group (the Sisters are less than 30 in
number,
most in Hong Kong
but one community in Calgary, Canada), it is also a fact that the
Sisters have
shown growth rather than decline since being incardinated in Hong Kong
in 1958.
They are always part of Salesian Family activity in
Hong Kong, especially in education, have an ecclesial assistant who is
a Salesian, and have had since the beginning - to which we can add the
fact that their charismatic founder is a recognised Saint of the
universal Church. There just was never any doubt that SAL meant
'Salesian' for these Sisters! Article 4 of their Constitutions
reads:
"In every circumstance the members must serve the Lord in holy joy,
proclaim the Gospel of the Kingdom with words and actions, and so tend
to the ends established by the Founder: 'They will be distinguished for
their zeal in the salvation of souls and in giving greater glory to
God'." It is all so redolent of St. John Bosco.
The Spirit has made one final move, it seems, on behalf of
the
Salesian Family and the SAL, and given a special gift for the centenary
of the arrival of Bishop Versiglia in Macau in 2006.
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