(Turin, April 12, 2019) - The Association of Mary Help of Christians (ADMA) will celebrate its 150th anniversary on 18 April. It was established in Turin on 18 April 1869 through the work of Saint Giovanni Bosco, the year after the consecration of the Church of Mary Help of Christians (June 9, 1868), as thanks for the benefits that people recognized to the Virgin and as a tool for the defense and growth of the faith of the Christian people.

The inspiration that moved Don Bosco was to offer a proposal for a simple Christian life that would sustain the ordinary life of the faithful, anchoring them firmly to the "two columns" of the Eucharist and of Mary, Immaculate and Help of Christians.

In the message sent on the occasion of this happy anniversary the President of the Primary ADMA of Turin-Valdocco, Renato Valera, said: “The coincidence with the liturgical date of Holy Thursday invites us to live this anniversary with a Eucharistic spirit. As we give thanks for these 150 years of life of the Association of Mary Help of Christians, let us commit, faithful to the charism of our holy founder Don Bosco, to letting ourselves be guided by the Holy Spirit for a renewed evangelizing and educational impulse."

"It is about living and bringing faith in Jesus Christ and love to Mary to many friends, family, colleagues, neighbors, acquaintances," continues Mr. Valera. "The essential part of this evangelizing impulse consists in renewing the Association with a privileged attention to the family and to the new generations, favoring and taking care of personal friendship, openness to all and the spirit of service, making the deeply evangelical attitudes of Mary our own: her availability to God, her faithfulness in the hour of trial and of the cross, her spirit of joy and thanksgiving for the marvels that the Lord works."

More specifically, the 800 groups of ADMA aggregated around the world are invited to plan, for Holy Thursday or at another time, a time of Eucharistic adoration in which to renew, with Mary, faith in Jesus Christ and the commitment to be joyful witnesses of the new life of the Gospel.

For more information, please visit: https://www.admadonbosco.org/  

(Rome, 18th February 2019) - The Rector Major of the Salesians, Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, has written a letter to all his confreres and to the Salesian Family in the world following the tragic death of Fr Antonio César Fernández, Spanish Salesian missionary, of the Francophone Province of West Africa (AFO), shot dead in an ambush struck by jihadist assassins, Friday, February 15, 2019, in Burkina Faso.

Rome, 16th February 2019

To my Salesian Confreres, to the Salesian Family in the world. My dear brethren, It’s just a few minutes I have arrived in Rome, “Sacro Cuore”, on my return from Ireland, where I was doing the visit to the Province of St. Patrick, whose headquarters are in Dublin, and I right away get in touch with all of you.

The reason for this is the sad and painful news that came a few hours ago, during the night, which informed me that our Salesian confrere Fr. Antonio César Fernández, missionary in Africa since 1982, has been assassinated yesterday, at 15.00 hours local time, with three shots during a jihadist attack perpetrated at about 40 kilometers from the border of Burkina Faso. Fortunately, two other confreres managed to survive the attack. They were coming from Lome, after celebrating the first session of the Provincial Chapter of the AFO Province.

Dear brethren, there are many days during the year in which I receive the news of the demise of Salesian confreres for natural causes. This is the law of life, and it will come for us as well. In such cases, however, we give thanks to the Lord for so many beautiful lives generously donated. 

But our confrere Antonio César war deprived of his life, they killed him without any reason. He was a good man, a man of God who, like the Lord, spent his life “doing good”, especially among his beloved African people. Antonio Cesar was 72 years old, with 55 years of religious profession and 46 of priestly life. We had met a few months ago in Burkina Faso, precisely in his community of Ouagadougou, where he was Rector and Parish Priest.

 Antonio Cesar adds to the number of many other martyrs of the Church today in the world (some of whom are Salesians and members of our Salesian Family).

I invite you to thank the Lord for the beautiful life of our Fr. Antonio César. And also to ask God the Father to help humankind to put an end to this escalation of violence which only causes damage. May the Lord grant that César’s blood, shed in African land, be the seed of Christians, faithful followers of Jesus, and of young vocations at the service of the Kingdom.

Rest in peace, dear César.

Dear brethren, let us proceed more united than ever in the service of the Peole of God, and of the pooerst youth. Evil never has the last word. The Resurrection of the Lord clearly shows this to us, and it follows that, even in suffering, it is becoming a reality that the Lord transforms everything. 

An embrace and a prayer from all of us for the eternal rest of Fr. Antonio César. As well as our affection to his family in Pozoblanco (Spain) and wherever they are, to the beloved Province of AFO to which he belonged and to the Province of Maria Auxiliadora in Spain where he learned to love Don Bosco and to live like him.

With true affection,

Fr. Ángel Fernández A., SDB

Rector Major

(Rome - October 20, 2017) - There are many people around the world who, inspired by Don Bosco, spend their lives far from their homeland to devote themselves to the mission of evangelization and the human development of other peoples. On the occasion of World Mission Day, celebrated Sunday, October 22, we want to remember some examples.

In the first continent Salesian missionaries reached, the primary goal remains to be among the poor young people to provide educational, human and spiritual support. "I was fortunate enough to know Fr Luigi Melesi, back from the first expedition 'Operation Mato Grosso' in 1967. He would talk about his experience with joy, and my heart would beat with excitement in hearing about it. So I decided to leave as a missionary ... I dreamed of spending my life for the poor," says Fr Ernesto Sirani, today a pastor of 15,000 souls in the Peruvian Andes.

Love for the recipients of one's mission is what is also perceived in an orphanage of Inharrime, Mozambique, where Sister Lucia Teixeira, Daughters of Mary Help of Christians (FMA), has lived and worked for 42 years. "Our little girls have no mothers or fathers, but they have found a family: they are happy to have us and we are happy to have them, because Salesian life makes sense only because they exist," she says.

Simon Mühlbauer, a 19-year-old German, decided to take part in the "Don Bosco Volunteers" program. Now he invites his German friends to volunteering as missionaries and wants to promote an inverse program where young people from developing countries are sent to Germany as guests of the Salesian communities. Of his experience, he says: "In my service, more than teaching I learned, and learning is something that concerns everyone."

Usually when thinking of missions, the countries of the South of the world come to mind. But there is also a great need for missionary support in Europe. José Liano, a Guatemalan Salesian, is now a missionary in Gjilan, Kosovo. When he decided to leave, some confreres said, "why go away, leave, if we have a lot of work to do here?" "True, there is a lot to do," he replied. "But if the first Salesians had not gone beyond, how would we have known God, Don Bosco and our vocation?"

As Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, Rector Major of the Salesians, and Successor of Don Bosco, has repeatedly stated, "we cannot forget our origins and our charismatic identity," that of a Congregation that is missionary by nature.

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