ROME: 7th January 2005 -- CDB stands for 'Con Don Bosco' (with Don Bosco) and it is the distinguishing term for a small but vibrant membership of the Salesian Family called, in English, Volunteers With Don Bosco.  In name and style they appear to be something like the male variety of the earlier established VDB or Volunteers of Don Bosco.  Similar yes, but the Holy Spirit breathes creatively and differently at different times in different places and with different people.

 

In Korea there are now 3 members of this group.  It is the first membership in the EAO region.  One is in the period of temporary profession, two are 'in formation', the CDB pseudonym for what we might term a novitiate of three years' duration.

 

The CDB journey began in the hearts of quite unconnected young men from Paraguay, Venezuela, Malta and Italy in the 1980's.  Fr. Vigano' brought them together in Rome to study possibilities for realising their dream and on 12 September 1994 they founded a Public Association of the Faithful known as the Volunteers With Don Bosco CDB.

They are now 70 in membership in 20 nations.  Korea is the most recent.

 

The ultimate aim, which they are close to realising, is to be recognised as a Secular Institute.  Already the CDB have a steady growth, a 'Formation Project' which is akin to a Ratio, and a revision process of their original statutes which is close to becoming a definitive set of Constitutions for a Secular Institute.  April of 2005 should see them bring this draft towards a degree of completion.  The text is already prepared in three languages - Italian, Spanish and English.