The meeting opened in the early afternoon of Tuesday, May 9, with a greeting from the 10th Successor of Don Bosco and an introductory speech from the Councilor for the ECN Region. "It is nice to all gather here in our home, in Valdocco, and to feel that we are all brothers, even if we speak different languages and come from different countries," began the Rector Major. He thanked all those present - Provincials and members of the Provincial Councils of 16 Provinces and one Vice-Province - for the vastness and quality of the work performed by the Salesians of the Region through a large number of deeds and services.

The Rector Major concluded by expressing his wish to all: "May these days be a fruitful time of listening and discernment, of fraternal and attentive dialogue, to find paths of renewal, growth, and consolidation."

Fr. Jachimowicz explained the program of the visit and the statistics of the Salesian presence in the Region. He represented in words and numbers the variety of works and apostolates carried out in nearly 250 Salesian centers, as well as the wealth of cultures, traditions, and languages that characterize the ECN.

The first work session, in the afternoon of the same day, saw Fr. Stefano Martoglio, Vicar of the Rector Major, take the stage, stating, "I have registered in these years of service as Vicar a great and intelligent generosity in the Congregational projects in which we are all engaged: this is a splendid sign of a renewed openness to the sense of Congregation that develops one of the post-capitular programmatic lines sent to us by our Rector Major." He then detailed the collaboration - already achieved and to be achieved - in the main areas of synergy and co-responsibility: the Central Headquarters, Salesian Sites, and the Salesian Pontifical University (UPS).

The first day ended with the intervention of the Rector Major's Central Delegate for the Secretariat for the Salesian Family (SF), Fr. Joan Lluís Playà, who presented the contribution that the SF can make to the processes of evangelization in the Region and to the formation process of Salesians and laity itself. He pointed out various processes to be maintained or implemented to foment the collaboration of the Congregation with the SF, invited to "continue to believe with conviction in the Salesian Family," and concluded by leaving some open questions for the participants to reflect upon.

On Wednesday, instead, animating the morning and afternoon sessions of the proceedings was Fr. Miguel Angel García Morcuende, General Councilor for Youth Ministry, with a talk titled, "Charismatic and Salesian Identity in Europe: bearing witness to the Gospel in a secularized world."

Fr. García Morcuende started from the diagnosis that already today many young people, especially in the countries of the ECN Region, "no longer believe or believe in a different way," but reiterated that the present time is always a "time that God loves" and that "everything depends on the love with which one observes." This is why he proposed four lessons that Salesians must grasp and make fruitful to learn from this crisis of faith in contemporary societies: to "live and act in the realities of hardship"; to also accept "the absence of results" visible in the short term, which does not always mean "absence of fruitfulness"; to cultivate "the virtue of boldness"; and to abandon any form of generalization to adopt an evangelical approach to the reality of youth.

Continuing, he recalled the need for the return to the essentials of the kerygma, the telling of the story of Jesus, and the falling in love of consecrated persons with the person of Christ Himself. And after pointing out some risks or temptations of pastoral work for Salesians today, he also proposed some escape routes "tailored for our young people."

- go out to meet young people with an attitude of wise Salesian sympathy, and a mobilizing, essential, and proactive pastoral approach;

- tell the Gospel in a way that is appropriate to the cultural models of the present;

- educate young people in interiority, with the awareness that "our young people have a spiritual desire and also the ability to satisfy it."

- and to have boys and girls live meaningful experiences, because "a proposal is charged with meaning when it is offered through experience."

On Thursday, May 11, the floor was instead passed to Fr. Ivo Coelho, General Councilor for Formation, who delved into the theme of Christian and Salesian formation of Salesians and lay people. In his report, the councilor offered various timely insights on the topic, also drawing on the great example offered by the writings and pastoral initiatives of St. Francis de Sales.

In the afternoon, the Team Visit participants continued their reflections in working groups and in open discussion with Fr. Coelho on the themes illustrated in the morning.

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