(ANS – Rome) – On 10 December 2020, the Rector Major, Rev. Fr. Ángel Fernández Artime, with the consent of his Council, nominated Rev. Fr. Jose Thomas KOYICKAL, SDB as the 8th Provincial of the Salesian Province of Sacred Heart, Bangalore, India for the six-year period of 2021-2027. The Province has 373 confreres who work in 44 communities in the States of Karnataka and Kerala in India. The Province also regularly sends missionaries to Nepal.
(ANS - Rome) - The winter session of the General Council is currently underway at the Salesian Headquarters. During this session, which began on 1 December and will end on 28 January 2021, the General Council is dwelling on the appointment of several new Provincials, on the study of various branches of the Congregation, on the Council's own formation, and on the collegial review in implementing the six-year Program of the Rector Major and of the General Council - program which has just been published in the Acts of the General Council n° 434, currently in Italian and English, soon also in other languages.
(ANS - Rome) - The Rector Major, Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, with the consensus of his Council, has appointed Fr José Pastor Ramírez as Provincial of the Salesian "St John Bosco" Province of the Antilles for 2021-2026. Fr Pastor Ramírez is currently Rector and Parish Priest of the "St John Bosco" house in Santo Domingo, Director of the Antilles Salesian Library, and also offers the service of Chaplain of the Sovereign Order of Malta in the Dominican Republic.
(ANS - Rome) - Yesterday, 8 December, a date dear to the Salesians, because it marks the beginning of Don Bosco's work in favor of poor and abandoned young people, the Rector Major, Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, launched an appeal inviting Salesians to discern if they are willing to put themselves at his disposal as missionaries ad gentes, ad exteros, ad vitam throughout the world.
(ANS - Rome) - On Saturday 5 December the Salesian Family recalled the liturgical memorial of Blessed Philip Rinaldi (1856-1931), Don Bosco's III Successor at the head of the Congregation. From his first profession, in 1880, until his death as Rector Major, he was involved in a great variety of Salesian charismatic enterprises, while always maintaining a rather low profile.
(ANS - Rome) - The famous Spanish visual artist Patxi Velasco Fano – aka "Fano" -, already designer of the Rector Major's 2018 Strenna poster, has for years been linked by ties of esteem and friendship to the Salesian Family. Knowing that the motto of the 2021 Strenna was "Moved by hope: 'See, I am making all things new'" (Rev 21,5), he spontaneously developed his own version of the Strenna poster with a "catechetical" design, an illustration addressed especially to children, and made it available to the Rector Major for free.
PHOTO GALLERY
INTERVIEWS
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RMG - Preparation, objectives, challenges and perspectives of GC29: in dialogue with the Moderator, Fr Alphonse Owoudou(ANS - RMG) - Just a few days before the beginning of the 29th General Chapter (GC29) of the Salesian Congregation, Fr Alphonse Owoudou, Councillor for the Africa-Madagascar Region and Moderator of GC29, recounts in detail, through an articulate interview, the work preceding and underlying this responsibility, indicating the spirit that will animate it and the attitudes and conditions to make it truly a Cenacle in which the Holy Spirit can act, for the benefit of the Congregation, the Salesian mission and the youth of the world.
EDITORIAL
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RMG – Don Bosco: “The Fascinating Saint”(ANS - Rome) - Don Bosco is perhaps the most amazing and fascinating saint, history has ever produced. The humble work which he began for the welfare of his poor and abandoned boys in Italy has produced astonishing results, and today there are nearly 14000 Salesians working in 138 countries, and there are more than 200,000 members belonging to the 32 groups of the worldwide Salesian Family sharing the charism of Don Bosco and reaching out to the needy young people.
EVENTS
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Spain – 33rd Edition of the Edebé Prize for Children's and Young Adult Literature: Here Are the Winners(ANS – Madrid) – The 33rd edition of the Edebé Prize for Children's and Young Adult Literature has been awarded to Beatriz Giménez de Ory (Madrid, 1972) for her novel Tres niños tristes y medio unicornio (Three Sad Children and Half a Unicorn) and David Lozano (Zaragoza, 1974) for his novel La cacería (The Hunt).
SPECIAL REPORTS
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United States – CATHOLIC WORLD DAY OF THE SICK: Salesian Missions highlights medical programs for people in need around the globe(ANS – New Rochelle) – Salesian Missions, the U.S. development arm of the Salesians of Don Bosco, joins Catholic organizations around the globe in honoring the Catholic World Day of the Sick. Every year on Feb. 11, the Pope marks the day with a special message calling for spiritual and physical closeness to all those who are ill. Saint John Paul II instituted the day “to encourage the people of God, Catholic health institutions and civil society to be increasingly attentive to the sick and to those who care for them.”
MESSAGES OF THE RECTOR MAJOR
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GOOD, FAITHFUL, AND COURAGEOUS SERVANTSTHE MESSAGE OF THE VICAR OF THE RECTOR MAJOR, Fr Stefano Martoglio, SDB
During this Jubilee year, in this difficult world, we are invited to rise up, set out again, and, in newness of life, make our journey as human beings and believers.