S TRENNA 2008

by Pascual Chávez Villanueva

EDUCATING WITH THE HEART OF DB

THE PREVENTIVE SYSTEM

“You have works, colleges, oratories for the young, but you have only one treasure: the pedagogy of Don Bosco. Risk losing everything else but preserve this pedagogy… The Lord has entrusted to you a pedagogy in which respect for the youngster prevails … Preserve it, renew it, rejuvenate it, enrich it with all the latest discoveries, adapt it to these youngsters of yours, who are treated badly in ways Don Bosco never experienced.”¹

What is this novel educational system? Don Bosco’s way is a pedagogical-pastoral art, since he translated the ardent charity of his priestly ministry into a practical form of the education of young people in the faith: pedagogy is an art that requires a real talent. It’s not a question of fixed or magic formulae, but rather of a combination of gifts that make the person capable of an educational paternity or maternity. The first of these is that of knowing one’s own times and knowing how to adapt to them. Then there are some particular characteristics including the following:

a.- The creativity of the artist in combining the pastoral impulse and educational intelligence. This is a question of an apostolic passion that feels itself challenged by the current climate of secularisation. In Don Bosco the thing that led him to act as a true artist was his approach of loving-kindness: building trust, familiarity and friendship. There is a great deal of the charismatic in the preventive system, of the “vocational call” and implies the mystic of pastoral charity (the passion of Da mihi animas”) and the ascesis of “making oneself loved” (“it is not enough to love the young. They need to know that they are loved”).

b.- In a relationship of solidarity with the young. Taking the first step, “going to the young” is “the first and fundamental need in the field of education.”² The young person is the active agent in educational practice and really ought to feel personally involved in what one is trying to achieve. Nothing can be done without his free collaboration. This is Don Bosco’s experience with his boys; he doesn’t act in a dictatorial fashion but shares responsibility with them. Nowadays an educational solidarity is more necessary than ever, given that the various educational agencies at work are not always in harmony with the formation needs of the young.

c.- With eyes fixed on the New Man. The aim of Salesian education is to produce in each young person conformity to the New Man (Christ). This is not taken into consideration by a secular education. For a Salesian educator Christ is the best news that one can give to a young person: He reveals God to us as Father, and tells us that in Christ we are sons and daughters of that Father. There is no greater dignity or better news to hand on. He alone is the Way, the Truth and the Life. The Christ/event is not the mere expression of a religious theory, but an objective fact of human history. Every person needs Him and tends towards Him, even if he doesn’t know it. The unhealthy search for efficiency and religious relativism is to the detriment of the personality of young people.

d.- By means of a work with a preventive character. Anticipation is a positive aspect of the art of education, proposing what is good in an attractive manner. It is the art of getting the young people to grow from within; with an interior freedom that goes beyond external conformity; it is the art of winning the hearts of the young so that they may cheerfully make progress, doing what is right, correcting their defects, preparing themselves for the future.

e.- Combining in an illuminating manner reason, religion and loving kindness that together produce a creative tension. They are not simply human values, nor just religious ones, nor a matter of amiability, but the three interact together, in an atmosphere of good-will, work, cheerfulness and sincerity. Naturally the practice of the preventive system becomes for the educator a demanding spirituality. It can’t be practised without a well-tried pastoral charity and a genuine apostolic passion. We are talking about a pedagogical holiness, attractive but deeply rooted which is marked by cheerfulness, based on being of service to the young, sacrifice, work and temperance (coetera tolle).

f.- With a creative approach to a young person’s free time. “Group experience is a fundamental element in Salesian pedagogical tradition.”³ At Chieri Young John Bosco founded the “Cheerful Society;” Dominic Savio founded the Sodality of the Immaculate Conception; Michael Magone belonged to the Blessed Sacrament Sodality … It is through groups that one is able to make contact with the surrounding area and each individual member of the group. Naturally it is necessary that competent personal accompaniment is made available, especially for the leaders and those in charge. ◙