Other "Salesian" Universities: a significant presence.

The number of Salesian Institutions of University level has increased in recent years. They differ, one from another; their juridical structure varies, the involvement of the Provinces in them is different, as also is the consistency of the salesian teams which run them. Some are looked after by a solid group of confreres with the well-defined roles of a university institution and also the educative, pastoral and popular objectives of our charism. Others go ahead with a variable number of confreres according to the qualified personnel the Province manages occasionally to free for the purpose.

It must be recognized that in this field it is not easy to ensure the conditions for significant salesian presence at a scientific, educative and pastoral level. In a few cases at the outset attention was directed especially to organizing a service to create the opportunity of a higher education amid the middle and poorer classes and fill the cultural gaps that existed. Nowadays one can no longer think that without specific preparation and an adequate staff one can express the "oratorian criterion" at this level by integrating preoccupation for organization and attention to cultural level, administrative management and pastoral effect. "Once the first organizing effort required by such initiatives has been accomplished, the moment comes to confront decisively and at community level the cultural and pastoral qualification beginning with the preparation of confreres and lay personnel’".

In the first place it is indispensable to define clearly the identity and orientation of these centres. While recognizing that they have a general set-up that takes its inspiration from the Christian mentality and passes on a humanistic and religious vision, there is always the risk of levelling down to the prevailing mentality rather than entering into dialogue for the sustaining of alternative proposals.

Numerous documents remind us of this effort for a clear structure and organization. The Church is going ahead, in the context of the new evangelization, with a cultural pastoral work aimed at bringing about changes in the economic and social area, in attitudes to life, in the elaboration of ethics, in the creation of new relationships, in proposing a sense which throws light on nature, history and present tensions. The light for all this comes from the mystery of God the Creator, the Saviour of mankind, the strength and goal of his story in the Spirit.

Our Universities must define their orientation in line with their Catholic character and their educative philosophy in harmony with salesian criteria, making themselves centres for the formation of persons and the elaboration of culture of Christian inspiration.

This is a missionary frontier which is relatively new and hence needs to be followed up, coordinated and clarified. It will be necessary to draw up an authoritative line of approach (a Project for Salesian Universities, almost a platform for proclaiming their fundamental inspiration), to foster dialogue and exchange of ideas between these institutions and follow up the progress of the Provinces in this new experience. The attainment of salesian objectives must be ensured, even at the level of the statutes.

But in addition to cultural orientation, an efficacious pastoral animation of the university environment must be provided. To the academic structures must be added, in this case, the many activities we carry out among university students, such as residential hostels, groups, religious care and similar matters.

They cannot be without an EPC, and in the first place the animating salesian nucleus. This means the preparation and dedication of salesian personnel, intense collaboration with lay people who have been selected and made aware of the character and purpose of our Universities, an attitude of openness and relationship with other cultural bodies, and the appropriate application of the preventive system and of the spirituality on which it is based. In a word: a requirement for salesian competence and for cultural and professional quality.

Just as in Houses of Spirituality we frequently find ourselves managing the structures without having available persons and teams capable of spiritual animation, it can also happen that in our university centres and hostels we may be providing structures and organization but not plans for life and the accompaniment of growth.

From the General Council we want to follow with particular attention the evolution of salesian work in this sector, which presents considerable challenges from an institutional aspect, and from the standpoint of those to whom the work is addressed, the collaborators, financial aspects and especially of the project itself, but which can be exceptionally fruitful for the evangelization of culture and for a particular presence in the world of education. There should be a corresponding commitment on the part of Provincials and their Councils.