(ANS – Rome) – In the context of the Spirituality Days of the Salesian Family, yesterday 22 January, the  Charter of Identity for the Salesian Family was officially presented and launched. This is a document which will help individuals and lay and religious groups to come to know and to assimilate Don Bosco and strengthen the links of communion and commitment in the Salesian mission. The “Charter of the Charismatic Identity for the Salesian Family of Don Bosco” is the result of wide-ranging and extensive process involving all the groups.

A draft had already been officially presented by Fr Chávez, at the conclusion of the Spirituality Days in 2010. This was a text which was required by the Church for the Salesian Family to be recognised as a spiritual and apostolic movement dedicated to the salvation of the young.

The text was given to the Councils of the Institutes, Congregations and Associations which make up the Salesian Family so that they could study and discuss it and make suggestions,  additions, corrections. These were then included in a second draft – which was presented during the meeting of the World Consultative Body of the Salesian Family held at the end of May  – and then given to the various groups for any final observations.

Yesterday 22 January, bringing the XXXth in the series of the Spirituality Days of the Salesian Family, to a close the Rector Major officially presented the document. Present for the occasion were those in charge (or their representatives) of almost all the groups of the Salesian Family. Also present were some of the Founders such as Guido Pedroni, of the Community of the Mission of Don Bosco and Fr Joseph D’Souza, of “The Disciples”.

“The Charter of Identity gathers together the reflections and the experiences which have matured in these years, starting from the two previous documents on the communion and the mission in our Family. These documents have been incorporated in their essentials in this new text. In this new Charter, in fact, are described the characteristic and the distinguishing elements of the Salesian Family, in other words those features in which all the Groups recognise themselves, in this way making possible a sharing of experiences, collaboration and visibility.”

“What is described in this third Charter, which incorporates and integrates the previous ones, is the charismatic identity of the Salesian Family, in other words, all that refers to the mission, the spirit, to the relationships, to  formation, to the methods of education and of evangelisation. Certainly, the history of the charism, considered in its origins and in its development, forms part of the identity; in fact an identity without a memory, being without roots, has no future. For this reason the Charter brings together the experience of the different Groups of the Family, tracing out in summary form, that identity of the Salesian charism that is the patrimony of all.”

The document is available, for the present only in Italian, on sdb.org.

Published 23/01/2012