The meeting began with a Lectio Divina on the Gospel text Mk 2:1-12. Afterward, some main themes for reflection were proposed.
First, the presentation of the content of the text "A Pastoral Care that Educates to Love," a text that will soon be published in several languages. Delegates paused to examine several educational criteria that foster the personal growth of young people in something as important as the development of these individual areas in a healthy way.
Secondly, the document "Vocational Animation, Inspiring Principle and Horizon of Youth Ministry" was addressed. In the reflection that followed the reading of the text, the reality of the provinces regarding the "vocational culture" in each Salesian house was shared. Vocation is a call to live in the world as the architect of one's own life and not as a spectator. Each young person is an actor, the protagonist of an exciting story. There are many ways to help awaken and mature a vocation. Pope Francis maintains that when the Lord inspires or gives rise to a vocation, think not only of what you are, but of all that, together with Him and with others, you can become. (ChV 289).
Finally, a motivational paper on the importance of pastoral planning and house visits was explored, insisting on the proper development of the Salesian Educational-Pastoral Project. Planning is always a process because it is something dynamic that involves a series of goal-directed actions, involving a sequence of steps and stages that lead to decisions about what to do, how, and for what purpose by an institution and its pastoral proposal; through planning it will be possible to achieve greater impact and succeed in transforming reality. Organized expectations of what one intends to do with one's pastoral proposal are desirable, increasing the degree of awareness, in a shift from the spontaneous to the predictable, giving events their desired destination, and directing change through organic pastoral care.
During the work, the degree of implementation of the themes addressed last year was also evaluated and several good practices developed in the different Provinces were shared.
Other topics of dialogue and reflection included the accompaniment of the Salesian Youth Movement, the process of updating the Oratory-Youth Center Framework, and initiatives for the celebration of the Bicentennial of the "9-Year Dream" in 2024, some information on the Salesian School in America (ESA, in Spanish), the Professional Training Network of America, the Salesian Social Action Network (RASS), World Youth Day Lisbon 2023, and initiatives promoted by the Youth Ministry Department on Integral Ecology.
