06.0586

Roma, 27 July 2006

Dear participants in the Seminar on Salesian Brother Vocation Promotion and Care!

This is the first time in the new millennium that you are holding a Seminar on Salesian Brother Vocation Promotion and Care, and some seven years since was celebrated the 4^th Regional Congress of Brothers in 1999. You have chosen to dwell on the care and promotion of the Brother’s vocation, and in doing so, you have taken your cue from the Guidelines and Policies that were spelt out in the Acts of the General Council, number 382, and that still retain their validity at the present day.

I am told that this Congress will bring together about 70 Salesians from your Region, including your Provincials, those responsible for formation, vocation promoters, and above all, some 45 Brothers. Representing the Rector Major and his Council will be Fr. Francis Cereda, the General Councillor for Formation, and Fr. Vaclav Klement, the Councillor for your Region. This is a very important meeting as it will trace the way forward for the Salesian Brother’s vocation in the Region for the coming years.

I know that you have been preparing for this Congress over the past 18 months, starting immediately after the Team Visit to your Region. All your Provinces have been involved, especially through your responses to a questionnaire, and I have seen how you have made good use of your regional website, Bosconet, to keep up the interest of your confreres and provide them with a wealth of materials in English on the Salesian Brother.

Your Region currently has 203 Brothers, and their number is growing in much the same way as in the Region of Africa-Madagascar. However, every gift entails a responsibility, and therefore, the gift of many Brother vocations to your Region means that you have the sacred duty of providing them with a good formation. Only formation will give them joy and fulfilment in their vocation, efficacy in their apostolate, and the grace of attracting many boys to follow them. I have seen a sign of your earnest commitment to the formation of your Brothers in the course of specific formation for Brothers that you have just begun at Manila. I was happy to authorize the course and I wish to congratulate and thank your Provincials and all those responsible for formation for this course.

My sincere and heartfelt wish for all of you is that this Seminar may be a joyful experience of Salesian brotherhood, and a unique occasion to share your joy and gratitude for the Brother’s vocation, to understand and appreciate it more deeply, reflect on the challenges it faces, and identify your future course of action to relaunch this vocation in your Region of East Asia and Oceania.

I would like you to know that I am close to you in my thoughts and in my prayers, and shall be following your Seminar with great interest and hope. I entrust your meeting to the hands of Mary, the Help of Christians. She was the inspiration and guide of Don Bosco in founding the Salesian Congregation comprising brothers and priests. May she accompany all your endeavours with her maternal guidance and render them abundantly fruitful.

Yours affectionately in Don Bosco,

Fr. Pascual Chávez Villanueva

Rector Major