NEW: ONE STOP 'FORMATION' SHOP FOR SALESIAN
FAMILY
Julian Fox sdb
ROME: 4th August -- A resource of this kind
has not previously been available to English speakers in the Salesian world - a
one stop source for formation within the Salesian Family. The
location? BOSCONET. After a number of years in an isolated location,
both Salesian-wise and geogrpahically, I personally found the need to discover
resources that I could put in front of young (and old) Salesians, be it for
Salesian Studies courses, community monthly retreats, discussions with laity,
semianrs for young people.....and living in a climate where books rather quickly
disintegrate, the availability of this material on The Net seemed to be the way
to go. Having received from the Net, by trawling through Salesian and
other sites, then putting together various little courses, talks and the like,
it also seemd good to give to the Net - or rather, to give to other Salesians
what I have found and what I have done with what I have found.
You can see for yourself at www.bosconet.aust.com . Why not
bookmark it immediately for further reference? You will see that the main
headings are the five main headings of Salesian 'departments' these days (I have
left out the Economer - there is room to add that if you have resources you can
suggest!): Formation, Youth Ministry (the old 'Youth Pastoral' which does not
sound well in English), Salesian Family, Missions, Communications - and a 'news'
section is there, of course, to include 'austraLasia' but also Bosco Link (US)
and Rua Link (UK) and a new venture we are getting off the ground called
BNN. But there are also quick left-hand links to ready reference sites
such as the Web Portal Rome, or Province pages all around the world - many of
which contain references of their own to formation mateirals.
Should it all be in English? Well, the idea
is to fill a niche - there's so much available in Italian and Spanish, but not
so much in English. But if you read Italian and Spanish - and other
languages besides, then they are all referenced through BOSCONET anyway!
In this sense, BOSCONET operates effectively as a portal.
Finally - there is so much good material sitting on
people's hard disks or on CD ROM backups, or better, on a server
somewhere. Would you consider either (a) sending me a copy of what you
have - I will include it directly on our server or (b) better, much better -
provide me with a link to your server where material sits. Please?
It would help others to help others.
Happy
surfing!
