Organised by Fr Nelson Moreno, Superior of the Saint Gabriel Archangel Province of Chile (CIL), Fr Maravilla's journey touched on Santiago, Valparaiso, Tierra del Fuego and the Salesian presences in Chilean Patagonia: Punta Arenas and Puerto Natales. From 24 to 25 November, accompanied by Fr Pedro Carrera, Rector, and his confreres from the community in Punta Arenas, the General Councillor visited Porvenir, the capital of the Chilean Province of Tierra del Fuego.
Fr Giuseppe Fagnano, SDB, reached Porvenir on 21 November 1886. In November 1887 Pope Leo XIII appointed him Prefect Apostolic of Southern Patagonia, Tierra del Fuego and the Falkland Islands. In the same year he moved the headquarters of the Apostolic Prefecture beyond the Strait of Magellan, to Punta Arenas.
In Porvenir the Salesians managed a parish, dedicated to Saint Francis de Sales, until 2015, when they handed it over to the local diocese; and from 1960 to 1976 they also had an agricultural school. The Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (FMA), for their part, had a secondary school until 2010, when they also ceded it to the diocese. On the Argentine side of Tierra del Fuego, today the Blessed Ceferino Namuncurá Province of Argentina South (ARS) has two communities, in Rio Grande and Ushuaia, which animate many sectors of Salesian work.
"As I walk through Porvenir, I am moved to remember the efforts made by the Salesians and the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians, under the guidance of Bishop Fagnano, to found the Church in these lands. The cemeteries at Porvenir and Punta Arenas bear witness to many young missionaries who died a few years after their arrival. The local municipal museum and in particular the ‘Complejo Histórico - Iglesia San Francisco de Sales’ immortalise their tireless commitment to Tierra del Fuego and Dawson Island, also built with a lack of personnel, to protect indigenous populations. Here, the heroic missionary history of the Salesian Congregation and the FMAs is intimately linked to the history of the people," Fr Maravilla testified.
"In my visits to different continents over the last four years I have realised that whenever there is a lack of personnel, the difficult presences on the borders are the first to be closed. Similarly, there is a reluctance in some Provinces to open new missionary presences, especially in the peripheries. During my visit I heard an inner voice urging me to launch an appeal from Tierra del Fuego to the whole Salesian world: ‘Let us not lose our missionary audacity! Let us rediscover the courage to dare and hope to reach new frontiers!’" the General Councillor for the Missions insisted.
