(ANS – Turin) – Fifty superiors of the SDB ILE and FMA ILO communities gathered in Valdocco (Turin) on 2 January 2 for a summit on educational leadership chaired by the Rector Major, Fr. Fabio Attard. The meeting, attended by Salesian rectors (SDB) and superiors of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (FMA) led by their respective Provincials, Fr. Roberto Dal Molin and Sr. Stefania Saccuman, focused on the prevention of pastoral burnout and the protection of charismatic identity.
In the first session, Fr. Fabio Attard reread the “Confidential Reminders,” a historic text sent by Don Bosco to the first rector, Fr. Michael Rua, in 1863. The analysis focused on the modernity of the founder’s recommendations regarding personal care: “Avoid austerity in food” and “each night you will have seven hours of rest.” The Rector Major updated these guidelines as an antidote to contemporary stress: “An exhausted superior cannot embody pastoral love. Self-care, far from being selfish, is an act of charity towards the young people entrusted to us.” Mental and physical health is indicated not as a luxury, but as a “necessary condition” for the mission.
The second focus of the day concerned the risk of “horizontalism” in educational works. Commenting on the post-Chapter letter “Mary arose and set out with haste,” the Rector Major warned against the transformation of Salesian presences into mere service agencies: “We cannot allow ourselves to convert our mission to the sole task of an NGO or a non-profit organization.” The challenge launched to local leaders is to overcome the logic of results and statistics, recovering the original synthesis of the charism: “We educate by evangelizing and we evangelize by educating.”
Finally, the meeting touched on the matter of “conditional availability,” criticising the tendency to commit oneself only in the face of immediate success or recognition. Salesian leadership, as emerged from the proceedings, must instead be based on a “balanced humanity” capable of discernment, avoiding individualism or the search for personal affirmation obscuring the communal nature of the mission.
(CS ILE)