In recent days the group has met with the aim of returning to the roots of this Salesian presence, thanks also to the valuable intervention of Fr Jean-Marie Petitclerc, Vice-Provincial of the Salesian Province of France-Belgium South (FRB). "Don Bosco himself guided the early years with enthusiasm, trials, miracles and above all so much tenacity, to make the work last and develop" said Fr Peticlerc.
Salesian history in Marseilles, in fact, is rich and long-standing. It begins with Don Bosco himself, who arrived in the city and founded the oratory of Saint-Léon, in 1878; a place that would later become the multipurpose Don Bosco Marseille Secondary School in the centre of the city, which today has about 800 students and apprentices.
In 1883, then, Don Bosco received as a donation the large country house in Pastré, which he had seen in a dream and which today is a school complex with 1,200 students, which also houses a house for elderly sisters and a residence for students.
A few years later, in 1905, the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians established the school at Sévigné with great intelligence and finesse, in full separation between Church and State. Today, this third Salesian house in the city hosts 1,600 students, from kindergarten to their final year, and has developed a social work program for children, the Œuvre Don Bosco. Sévigné is one of the five largest structures of the Salesian Family in France, in terms of the number of young people involved.
The story still continues today: the Le Valdocco Association has decided to open a headquarters in 2019, very close to Sévigné, in the Rose district, and the Don Bosco Institute (based in Gradignan) has been called since October 2022 to manage an educational centre, the CEF Don Bosco, in the 13th arrondissement of the city.
For more information, please visit: www.don-bosco.net
Source: Don Bosco Aujourd'hui -
