By Fr. Hugo Orozco, SDB (Interamerican Regional)

(On August 24, 2026 in Bellflower, California, Fr. Joe Nguyen, SDB was installed during Mass as the new Provincial of the Salesians in the western United States. The presider was Fr. Hugo Orozco, SDB, the Interamerican Regional. His homily is published below with his permission.)

Dear Fr. Joe and confreres of the Province of St. Andrew the Apostle,

I am very happy to be a personal witness to what we are celebrating today.

A few months ago, together we asked God for the presence of his Holy Spirit, to give the Rector Major and his Council the wisdom and guidance needed for the discernment involved in appointing the Provincial of the SUO Province for the next six years.

I heard you pray to God for the Salesian who would be called to this responsibility, and here we are today. I am confident that you are the one God is giving us as Provincial of SUO. I truly believe this.
So, with you, my dear confreres, I thank God for his providence, and I ask him to make us strong in faith and trust.

Those who exercise authority among us are inspired by the words of Jesus Christ, who presents himself as the servant of all. Faithful to our charism, we are also inspired by Don Bosco, who understood the Provincial as a father to all. The Gospel and Don Bosco: these are two criteria to inspire the service of Provincial that you are now beginning.

The vocation of Bartholomew, the apostle, gives us another insight that we can hear in the context of our celebration. The One who has always called you, who has known you from before you realized it and who has loved you, is now giving you a new mission. This conviction in our life of faith gives us, first of all, the certainty of God’s love for us and of the invitation he makes to follow him. Nothing more, and no other condition, than to respond freely to that love and to love as he does.

I don’t know about you, but when I began my vocation as a Salesian of Don Bosco, it was very easy to recognize that I wanted to love God and that I wanted to love young people. But I never really thought about loving the confreres in the Congregation. The God who knows us, who loves us and who invites us to follow him calls us not only to live with him, but to live like him and to love like him, freely and generously. This new obedience that you receive, dear Joe, is not something you chose. Rather, it is a call to love people whom you did not choose, unconditionally, each and every one. And that will make your heart bigger; it will enlarge your heart. Take care of these Salesian confreres whom the Lord entrusts to you. Serve them with charity, love them, encourage them to respond to that divine love, and help them to live this beautiful vocation that he has given us.

You have some very specific tasks that will require intelligence and leadership. Do not be afraid. Always seek the help you need. The ability to listen will be a skill that you will have to cultivate with even greater care, as will the ability to make decisions with trust in the Holy Spirit, supported also by your confreres on the Council, your Directors and all the Salesians in our communities. Do not stop listening to anyone. In the voice of all your brothers and sisters, the Lord will speak to you and accompany you. Synodality is not a matter of fashion, senior management or business leadership. It is a humble practice of the Christian community, which recognizes, even in the weakest, the voice of God.

Don Bosco invites you to be a father. And, as strange as it may seem, you will be a father even to Salesians who are older than you. Fatherhood may have connections to your own family history, but it is also deeply connected to the fatherhood of Don Bosco. It seems that God has prepared you for this service because, for the last nine years as Master of Novices, you have dedicated yourself to studying and making known these paternal traits of our Founder. You know well his love for young people, but also his love for the Salesians who arose precisely from among them. Trust, closeness, patience and kindness—all that the Preventive System teaches us—will be very useful for your ministry as Provincial. Animating and governing according to the Preventive System and in the spirit of Don Bosco can also be a great source of inspiration.

In a special way, dear Joe, I also encourage you to experience your fatherhood with the young people whom Providence brings to us, especially those who, for various circumstances, suffer the consequences of unjust or inhumane systems; those who are singled out and marginalized. It is to them that we have been sent.

I would like to conclude by keeping in mind today, August 24, our Mother and Teacher, the Virgin Mary, to whom Don Bosco entrusted all his undertakings, all his dreams and his fears. Do not fail to keep her in mind and to invoke her help and intercession. Learn from her silence, from her ability to listen to God and from her generosity in service.

I am very grateful to Mel, who, with his simplicity and intelligence, has accompanied the Province these last six years. He has also worked closely with the other twelve Provincials of the Inter-American Region. I am a witness to his generous dedication and to the best that he has given, especially as he discerned and responded to the movements of the Holy Spirit. I ask God to fill you with blessings for all that you have given so generously.