- The Cross: the first powerful symbol is the cross itself. Receiving the Cross expresses many emotions and spiritual challenges. The life of the missionary is centred in the person of Christ and of Christ crucified. It implies that the missionary first receives and then passes on the great teaching of the Cross: the infinite love of the Father who gives the best of himself, his Son; love to the end that is obedient and generous in giving oneself to the will of the Father for the salvation of humanity.

- The Mission and the Cross: in traditional missionary iconography the missionary is depicted showing the cross to the people. That gesture, which to some might seem a bit naive, symbolizes that for us Salesians "Our highest knowledge […] is to know Jesus Christ, and our greatest delight is to reveal to all people the unfathomable riches of his mystery."  (Salesian Constitutions art. 34).

- The Good Shepherd: according to the Salesian charism the cross is lived in unlimited pastoral self-giving. The Good Shepherd reveals Salesian Christology: pastoral charity is the nucleus of the Salesian spirit, "the attitude that wins hearts by gentleness and self-giving" (Salesian Constitutions art. 10-11).

- Da Mihi Animas cetera Tolle (give me souls, take away the rest): This is the motto that characterized the Sons of Don Bosco from the beginning. In a missionary context this brief Salesian prayer acquires particular significance: leave everything, even one’s land and culture, and the things that give security, in order to devote oneself without limit to those to whom one is sent, to be an instrument of salvation for them.

- The Holy Spirit who descends on the Good Shepherd as in the river Jordan, descends now on Christ present in the pastoral dynamism of the Church. Without the Holy Spirit, and without the light, discernment, strength and holiness that come from the Spirit, all missionary activity is no more than a series of activities, sometimes empty, carried out in distant places.

- Matthew 28:19: "Euntes ergo docete omnes nationes baptizantes eos in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti" (Go therefore and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit): the heart of the missionary mandate given by the Risen Lord. The text gives a mandate to teach all people so that they may become followers and disciples of Jesus (the Greek text emphasizes mathêteúsate, "make disciples", which is more than just docete, “teach”). Evangelization, the fullness of grace, comes through words and deeds, with the greatest of all the sacramental graces which is baptism that plunges the person into the mystery of communion with God.

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