following his advice.
Don Bosco's spiritual direction was totally illuminated by "the gift of counsel" which enabled him to guide safely
those who turned to him.
3. The intense work which Don Bosco undertook on behalf of vocations was sustained by an intense love for the
Church: with total dedication, he devoted all his efforts to obtaining its good. It is precisely this love for the
Church that enables us to understand the importance he gave to the apostolic activity of fostering vocations and
his insistence that all should work together and devote themselves to obtaining for the Church the great treasure
which vocations represent. Thus he used to say: "Whenever we procure a good vocation we are giving an
inestimable treasure to the Church; it does not matter whether this vocation or this priest goes to the diocese, the
foreign missions or a religious order. It is always a great gift that we give to the Church of Jesus Christ".' This
view of the good of the whole Church never left him, not even when it engaged all his efforts, all his time, the
financial means which cost his so much hard work, nor when it involved his limited personnel or his houses.
° Summarium, 676 par. 14.
"Run, run quick to save those boys...!" This appeal of the dying Don Bosco we can consider as addressed not only
to those present at that moment in his room, but to the, whole Salesian Family in general. An appeal which is
pressing and always will be, because the young people of all times are in need of "salvation".
The dying Don Bosco addresses this invitation also to us. It is an invitation to roll up our sleeves and to work hard
so that around us a good number of sound Salesian vocations bud, flower and come to maturity, as they did
around him. Taking up this invitation requires that each one of us renews the holy passion for the salvation of
youth which Don Bosco himself had; this passion will give us courage and enable us to overcome the fear of not
being understood or of being marginalised or rejected by this secularised and pagan world of ours, which rejects
diversity, suppresses the supernatural and marginalises the believer.
Let us therefore fearlessly live a style of life which challenges this world and this society which does not allow the
holistic development and promotion of the human person; a style of life which provides the stimulus for living out
one's vocation with joy and enthusiasm and for proposing to young people and adults, men and women, boys and
girls, the Salesian vocation as a suitable response of salvation to this world of today,, and as a plan of life capable
of making a positive contribution to the renewal of present day society. This is what article 28 of the Constitutions
of the Salesians of Don Bosco has to say: "We are convinced that many young people are rich in spiritual
potential and give indications of an apostolic vocation. We help them to discover, accept and develop the gift of a
lay, consecrated or priestly vocation for the benefit of the whole Church and of the Salesian Family". This
commitment had been one of the purposes of the Congregation even before its approval' and nowadays takes on
an extraordinary urgency (cf. C. 6), as the Church repeatedly reminds us.
' BM XVII, p. 236. BM XVIII, p. 449.
2. A prior need: to create and develop a vocational culture"
"It is necessary, therefore, to promote a culture of vocation which will recognize and welcome this profound
human aspiration, which brings a person to discover that Christ alone can tell him the truth about life"." Speaking
about a culture of vocation, as, for the first time John Paul II did, is nowadays not only pertinent, but also urgent.
In fact we can see that sometimes there is a gap between what people are doing generously and well-intentioned
and the collective mentality, between individual initiatives and society's actions, between the practice and its
foundations. Thus in the Congregation, as in the Salesian Family, we see that there can be a certain amount of
work for vocations by individuals, the so-called Delegates for vocations, but at the same time, in the communities
or in the groups, one notices that a real culture of vocation does not exist.
° Even though there is no article on minor seminaries in the first exstant text of the Constitutions, Don Rua's
manuscript of 1858, one was introduced by Don Bosco in the draft of 1860. Cf. G. Bosco, Costituzioni della
Society di S. Francesco di Sales [1858] — 1875. Edizione critica di Francesco MOTTO, Roma, LAS, 1982, pp.
76-77.
" For this section I draw freely on the article "Cultura della Vocazione", by Fr JUAN E. VECCHI, in Dizionario
della Pastorale Vocazionale, Libreria Editrice Rogate, Roma 2002, pp. 370-382.
" JOHN PAUL II, Message for the XXX World Day of Prayer for vocations (8 September 1992).
This culture in fact, requires not individual initiatives no matter how numerous, but a mindset and an attitude
shared by a group; it is a question not only of private intentions and good resolutions, but the systematic and
deliberate employment of the forces which the community has at its disposal. A vocational culture, understood in
this way operates in three areas: the anthropological, the educational and the pastoral. The first refers to the way in
which being a human person is seen and presented as vocation; the second aims at fostering a appreciation of
values conducive to vocation; the third pays attention to the relationbship between vocation and the underlying
culture and draws conclusions from this for vocation work.
Life is vocation
We know that underlying all educational and pastoral activities there is a particular view of mankind, one that is
either spontaneous or the result of reflection. For the Christian it evolves in the course of life, with the mental