1224 Guidelines released for Salesian Studies in initial formation
austraLasia 1224
Guidelines released for Salesian Studies in initial
formation
ROME: 5 August 2005 -- A long-awaited set of guidelines for
Salesian Studies in initial formation has been forwarded to those in
Provinces with direct responsibility for this area. The
guidelines, which also includes indication of a set of texts for each
phase, constitute a frame of reference based on the Ratio and have been
approved ad experimentum until July 2009.
The General Councillor for Formation, Fr Francis
Cereda, makes the point that these guidelines are intended to be
applied gradually, since the circumstances throughout the Congregation
are varied and it will not be possible to apply everything everywhere
and all at once. He urges provinces to to carry out what they can
as well as they can, bearing in mind now the direction clearly
outlined, and endeavouring to make some progress each year. The
guidelines' implementation implies a number of other important choices
such as preparation of teachers, translation of texts, some knowledge
of Italian and so forth.
The guidelines cover the stages from Prenovitiate
through to specific post novitiate formation of Brothers and
Priests. It is intended that they be consecutive in application,
and for the postnovitiate and specific formation stages, the intention
is that they carry a two credit weight per semester in Salesian Study
Centre academic programmes. There is no suggested credit level
for prenovitiate and novitiate stages.
For the English-speaking world, the challenge will
now be to have as many of these basic text resources in English.
They are divided, in most stages, into Salesian sources and other
commentary or study texts. The good news is that for the
prenovitiate and novitiate stages, the source texts are already in
English, and some are in process of being reprinted in updated version:
Teresio Bosco's Don Bosco (the title in Italian adds: a new
biography), Brocardo's Don Bosco, Deeply Human, Deeply Holy
(the 1985 edition is in English - there is a new 2000 Italian edition),
The Memoirs of the Oratory, The Biographical Memoirs, Constitutions
and Regulations, Project of Life and a commentary in AGC
312 by Fr. Viganò, as well as several texts of Salesian
hagiography. The real challenge will be to get the several
copious volumes by Peter Braido into English and Peter Stella's texts
reprinted for Postnovitiate and specific formation stages.
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