New Delhi: The Salesians, such as the Indian priest abducted in Yemen, take personal risks to go to dangersous places to serve the poor and the destitute, says the head of the congregation.
“We are much appreciated globally because we go to places which nobody wants to go and we make an option for the poor,” Fr Ángel Fernández Artime, Rector Major of the Salesians of Don Bosco, said on March 10, the second day of his visit to the Philippines.
As the Salesian chief spoke, his congregation was trying to rescue Fr Tom Uzhunnalil, who was kidnapped by gunmen on March 4 from a Missionaries of Charity convent in Aden.
The priest’s kidnappers killed 16 people, including four Missionaries of Charity nuns, who managed a center for elderly in that southern port city in Yemen.
Fr. Uzhunnalil, a native of Kerala, southern India, was praying in the convent chapel at the time of the attack. He was among four Salesians, all from the Bangalore province, who have been assisting the Mother Teresa nuns in four cities of the Islamic state since 1987.
In the southern Philippines, the Salesian chief spent time at Don Bosco Formation Center, in Lawaan, Talisay , addressing Salesians from different communities of Cebu and Dumaguete.
He talked about the challenges Salesians faced in Sudan, Yemen, Pakistan and Mongolia where the Filipino and other Asian Salesians work.
He even jokingly said appealing for volunteers to opt for overseas missions. “It is a ‘Salesian sin’ if your provincial asked you not to apply directly to the Rector Major for mission ad gentes or not to allow you for mission abroad.”
Referring to Don Bosco who sent his first missionaries in 1875, just 15 years after founding the congregation, Fr Artime reminded them saying, “Don’t forget that Don Bosco himself chose to send missionaries to Patagonia and other parts of South America. Were it not for this missionary choice, we all would not be here today.”
The Rector Major challenged the Salesians to continue the mission of Don Bosco.
The Salesian chief also challenged his men to live the consecration and carry the mission not as a social worker; safeguard fraternal life; have a special love for the poor; and stay humble and not seeking for power.
In Yemen, Salesians worked in cities such as Sana’a, the capital; Aden, Hodeida and Taiz . The Missionaries of Charity went there in 1970.
Since 2001 Salesians work in Mongolia with Skills Training Centre, shelter for street children at the Boys Town and Building full-time youth centers.
The first batch of six Salesian pioneers who entered the country in 2001 were from four different countries – Vietnam, South Korea, Slovakia and the Philippines as the second male order to make enter the country after the Scheut Missionaries – the Congregation of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, CICM in 1992.
In South Sudan, Salesians work since 1983. As they felt increasing in secure in Tonj they shifted to Wau, a relatively safe town. Indian missionary Fr James Pulickal worked there. He was abducted by the Sudan People’s Liberation Army and forced him to march with the guerrilla fighters. He was released after 18 months. Fear of further abductions forced the Salesian superiors to close the community in Juba, another southern Sudan city.
The Salesians came to Pakistan 20 years ago in 1995 when the Salesian presence in Pakistan was approved and the first Salesians reached Quetta and later Lahore to run technical schools.
The first batch of 11 Salesian missionaries came to northeast India in 1922. They took over missions left abandoned for several years during and after World War I (July 1914 to November 1918) when the German Salvatorian missionaries were expelled by the British.