by Fr Pierluigi Cameroni
In the solemn ceremony of the Missionary Expedition in Turin, 1921, Msgr. Mathias spoke of the Assam Missions using expressions like "our promised land", "land that has no equals", the "new Patagonia". Referring to the many languages of India, especially in Assam, Msgr. Mathias said: "We Salesians will speak the Lord's language and repeat the wonders of the first Pentecost."
On May 24, 1922, at the end of the first Marian Procession, the few Salesians of Assam knelt before the statue of Mary Help of Christians and consecrated the Assam missions with a fervent prayer: "We consecrate to you this land, its mountains, its rivers, its people and all its inhabitants." A few years later the Salesians and other observers described the Assam missions as "the miracle of the Madonna."
And indeed some numbers truly have us thinking of a "miracle". Upon the arrival of the spiritual Sons of Don Bosco in Assam, the entire Northeast of India was an Apostolic Prefecture with a small number of Catholics: 5,000. Today that region has 15 dioceses, with a Catholic population of 1,200,000 faithful.
Heroism and holiness: Msgr. Mathias had chosen as the motto for the pioneering group: "audacity and hope". Not only the pioneers, but also their successors lived this motto. The mission in Assam has lived and still lives in situations that are a real challenge: a terrain with a difficult orographic profile; hundreds of languages that have no relation to each other; conflicting traditions and social practices. Much of the missionaries heroically faced the restictions and hardships; some offered their lives.
The holiness they lived has rendered its fruit. Among these figures, some are on the path to recognition of holiness: the venerable Stefano Ferrando, bishop and founder of the Missionary Sisters of Mary Help of Christians (MSMHC); the Servant of God Constantine Vendrame, great apostle of the Gospel; the Servant of God Oreste Marengo, bishop and founder of three dioceses; and the venerable Francesco Convertini, who did his formation in North East India and then was sent to the state of Bengal.
