VIDEO SUL SISTEMA PREVENTIVO


Good morning!  Aren’t you the priest Giovanni Bosco? The father, teacher, and friend of young people! 
DON BOSCO – Yes that’s me!

What are you doing up here?
 I’m watching my youngsters.

 You never grow tired of them do you?… 
DON BOSCO – Not at all! I promised God that I would stay with them until my dying breath. I love being among them! 

Have they changed at all?
DON BOSCO – Not that much.  And neither have the Salesians!
 There are a lot more of them though… 
Yes, and they talk in many languages unknown to me….and their smiles are made up of beautiful and diverse colours! Like the colours of the lands in which they live, and which I saw in my dreams such a long time ago. 

Their needs however, are still the same: they call for love, faith and hope! And we must possess eyes and hearts to welcome them. We have to be present, and face with courage and competence daily challenges. 

Of course dear Don Bosco. Young people, in so many places, still need to be fed, and learn about that freely given love capable of healing wounds, and launching projects full of hope. 
DON BOSCO – youthful vitality needs direction, with all the most appropriate means! Just think about schooling, and professional workshops…..we need to take care of the young, educating them according to their needs and their capabilities. 

 Don Pascual Chavez (visit to ILT)
«When I’m in contact with young people, within various contexts, I realise that, especially in developing countries such as Latin America, Asia, and Oceania, they truly represent the present. And the only thing that they desire is the opportunity to develop all their resources to the full; all their dimensions and their faculties”
 Rita De Padova  (Loreto MGS)
«Today we should probably translate this into a spiritual poverty, in to a poverty of values. Today who would Don Bosco have seen? Who is the Michele Magone of today? »
«We can talk of prevention when we offer young people a new start, and a meaningful relationship, especially for those who have experienced dramatic situations within their lives »
«Prevention in the sense of not losing one single life»

 ABEL, animator of the Youth Centre  (Kabwe)      [ingl]

«My prospects….well, what I expect from the Salesians most of all, is that after taking care of me, they continue to develop the infrastructure here, especially academic structures. I mean that after completing school, some youngsters have nothing to do, and I hope the Salesians find something for them …...
 These fathers give them the instruments, maybe even a guitar! Even by playing a guitar you can find yourself, and find something good to do in life. I hope that those with talent will have the possibility of studying, maybe even singing. Money is not the important thing….in this Centre they can find help».
 
 Why don’t we go down to the courtyard Don Bosco?!
 DON BOSCO - ...the courtyard! The courtyard!…
 of course they are no longer just those of the oratory…..as in the beginning of the Salesian adventure. Young people need to be sought and met in the places where they like to meet up, in the most hidden places, and those dearest to their hearts.  

 Don Ugo De Censi, SDB  (Perù)
«It seems to me that young people are left to live in a certain way they obliges them to live within a lifestyle that includes simply school and play…..young people however feel that this is a sort of life that they don’t like…they are restless. I try to welcome those youngsters who are not particularly happy with their lives, and live within a world in which they do not feel comfortable.  …
What I see is that young people lack a true sense of what life is, because they lack love, and they lack love because they lack God». 
 DON BOSCO – the salvation and educational strength of the sacraments hold up an entire educational structure… 
Their beauty and fruitfulness for the harmonious development of the heart and personality, must be proclaimed and encouraged within even the youngest children.

You see, my dear friend, loving is an art, that calls for learning and good teachers. 
The practise of the Preventive System is first of all spirituality, and a sort of evangelical life that finds its model in Jesus. 
Only after, my Salesians, together with the educational and pastoral community, translate this into a pedagogic method.

Reason, Religion, and love… to educate good Christians and honest citizens….
The work of his Salesians, and the validity of the Preventive system is still up to the challenge….but are the concepts of courtyard assistance, friendliness, a timely chosen word, and the confession, still valid and practical? 

DON BOSCO – Of course! Familiarity leads to affection, and affection leads to friendship. 
Young people become sincere through confession, and outside of confession they are receptive to ideas presented by those who they feel really love them.


 Vito Cecere    (Loreto MGS)
«Everyday experiences show us that the Preventive System, is above all an inter-personal relationship, which begins, and is lived out through daily contact with the young people who live alongside us».  


D’Urso    (Loreto MGS)
Don Bosco did not limit his horizons to an educational system that solely involved school and church. The courtyard is vital, a place to meet friends, because, in order to draw young people into an educational, religious, and social dimension, interpersonal relationships are fundamental. Otherwise we risk doing a great deal for young people, with enormous sacrifices, without them being aware of what we have done, and therefore without any long lasting consequences on the level of educational processes. 
Don Antonio Domenech  (GSFS 2007)
«the first path we must offer to young people is a witness of life, our life is a seed within the field of young people….our life. The younger generations need to encounter real “teachers of life”. They look for people who can offer them a positive path, which stimulates them, and accompanies them in the development of their best qualities and possibilities » 

DON BOSCO – I am moved by the passion of so many Salesians in their work with young people, and the apostolate of so many youngsters, who set off to be missionaries for other young people, maturing their vocational choices for a special consecration.  

My Salesians must know how to listen, and guide with love, exercising patience and charity.
The teachers must be the first to offer an example of harmony, prayer, and tireless work. 

The heart of a father is always on the alert though?
DON BOSCO – Of course: I continue to pray to Mary Help of Christians, that the apostolic ardour within them will never wane, or their charismatic identity fade.  
Actually, a new Pentecost needs to invest the Salesians to the benefit of young people and the entire Salesian family, above all in the capacity to inspire new consecrated lives! 

Don Chavez (visita Genova)
«…because we are not fruit of Don Bosco’s geniality, each one of us is a gift of the Holy Spirit. 
Therefore we are a spiritual movement: each one of us is a vocation. God depends on us to make young people’s lives full of happiness»

Don Frisoli  (Loreto)
«We need even more Salesians! I have to say there is a great effort to involve the lay community, collaborators, teachers, the workers within the training centres, catechists, and lay educators in the oratories, because educational work, is no longer entrusted to the responsibility of the Salesians, but an entire educational community»


 Don Ricca
«Resources are now more limited. It means rethinking, recreating, a way of staying within the reality, yet present! » 
«it means involving a wider group, not just us Salesians, because we are not the only receivers of Don Bosco’s mission, it involves the entire Salesian family, the co-operators, young people, and the MGS (Youth Salesian Movement). We have a series of situations which I believe should be involved much more, but seriously…..and I believe they need monitoring seriously, in what they actually do »

DON BOSCO - But, dear friend, the souls, the souls!...Nothing else! 

We must deliver our young people to Christ! 
Sanctity must be our pastoral programme, and evangelisation our priority mission, according to the actual direction of the Church.

Let us return to Christ, to an evangelical poverty and the essence of the Good Word…and yes…..let us return again and again to our missionary work, with willingness and trust. We will see the flowering of new vocations, and the rebirth of our community. 

Don Chavez  (Loreto)
And when I said, “there is a need to launch a pastoral for young people, it is because it must be explicitly evangelic. A pastoral which does not evangelise is not pastoral.
 
Don Frisoli   (Loreto)
«If a young person has a real, deep religious experience, especially if they come into contact with the witness of credible people, especially people of their own age or credible teachers, they become truly involved. 
The Lord Jesus is always fascinating, and is capable of involving the entire existence of a young person.
If the witness is credible, the answer will be just as decisive. 

 
Don LUIGI BOLLA
«When the ship left from Genoa, I experienced one of the most beautiful moments of my life. You feel as if the ship sets off with an incredible slowness…..and everything dies within you: your friends, homeland, your mountains, and your people….and I recall…and I think it is the thought of all missionaries….that I said  “Lord, I have lost everything, I have nothing left but you, because I know nothing of the new world’. 
This is the experience I would like to share, because it should encourage young people who often have many doubts, and say “I’ll just go and try”. It’s best to go willing, and to offer all..»