Don Bosco Mission USA 125

02/01/2024

We Salesians in Berkeley celebrated Don Bosco’s feast day yesterday as a community with friends from the Dominican friars and the Holy Cross Sisters. Now we are ready to launch into February.

04/20/2023

Alejandro Rodríguez, SDB, PhD, has arrived in Bolivia, where he is offering a series of conferences, classes, and study days for members of the Salesian Family and the Don Bosco educational network. He offers innovative input as Professor of Education and Leadership at the Institute of Salesian Studies and Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology of Berkeley.

Best wishes to Fr Alex and the educators in Bolivia.

11/10/2022

03/26/2022

When the Salesians arrived in San Francisco on 11 March 1897, they settled immediately at SS Peter and Paul Church. The church, located at Dupont Street on Telegraph Hill, had been built in 1894 as a worship and social center for Italian immigrants. The outgoing pastor, Fr Raffaele de Carolis, welcomed the Salesian missionaries. Two days later he would bring them to meet the Archbishop.

This photo is of Telegraph Hill in the 1890s.

03/11/2022

The Salesians missionaries who arrived in San Francisco in 1897 were financed in that first mission endeavor by the St Vincent de Paul Society, with which the Salesian Society in Torino had always closely collaborated.

03/04/2022

Archbishop Patrick William Riordan Invited Don Rua to send Salesians to initiate pastoral work among Italian immigrants in California. Fr Piperni and his team of 3 Salesian missionaries arrived at SS Peter and Paul Church in San Francisco on Friday 11 March 1897. The archbishop gave clear instructions: work only with the Italians. Do not get mixed up with American parishes.

The archbishop's instructions were in keeping with the principles set down by the U.S. bishops for national parishes. However, Archbishop Riordan understood the immigrant experience. His parents, Mary Dunne and Matthew Riordan, had migrated from Ireland to Canada during the Potato Famine. Patrick was born in Chattam, New Brunswick, on 27 August 1841. His parents brought him to Chicago, Illinois, when they migrated to the USA in 1848. It was there that he would receive a strongly Catholic education with studies at St Mary's of the Lake (Chicago) and Notre Dame (Indiana). He went on for seminary studies in Rome as one of the first students at the North American College, then in Paris and at Leuven University in Brussels, where he earned a doctorate in theology at age 23. Patrick Riordan was ordained in 1865. After missionary work in Joliet and parish work in Chicago, Riordan became the second Archbishop of San Francisco on 28 December 1884.

Archbishop Riordan's own experiences as an immigrant and a missionary made him very compassionate to the plight of new arrivals in San Francisco. Within 5 years their arrival, Archbishop Riordan encouraged the Salesians to expand their work beyond the Italian community. By 1902 Salesians worked in 4 parishes in the archdiocese: two in San Francisco and two across the Bay in Oakland among young people of Italian, Portuguese, Mexican and other immigrant families.

During the earthquake of 1906, Archbishop Riordan mobilized relief work for the people, and inspired them to have courage and rebuild the city. He died in San Francisco on 27 December 1914 at age 73, after 30 years as archbishop.

03/01/2022

11 November 1875: Don Bosco sent the first Salesian missionaries from Torino. The group, all of whom grew up at Don Bosco's first oratory, was destined for Argentina.

Here is that first group. St John Bosco, slouching in the chair just left of center, hands the newly approved Constitutions of the Salesian Society to Fr John Cagliero, leader of the expedition. To the saint's left is the Consul General of Argentina who arranged for the Salesians to go to Viedma. It was an awesome step, and the young group did not know what to expect, but they were eager to serve.

03/01/2022

Nearly every year since 1875 Salesians have volunteerd to leave home and serve young people developing countries. The latest group (for the 152nd expedition) is pictured here on the eve of their departure as missionaries on 21 November 2021. At top left in the back row is Bro Daniel Glass, Salesian from the Eastern USA, who has gone to serve in Congo.

In the 125 years since the first missionaries came to North America, many Americans and Canadians have gone to serve as Salesian missionaries along with Salesians from around the world to serve in the places where there is most need.

03/01/2022

“COMMUNICATING CHRIST TODAY - # MissionariesOnline”

From J.C. Montenegro @ St Dominic Savio Bellflower:

"Evangelization entail relationships that need good communication skills to convey the Gospel message. This year the Salesian Mission Day in the San Francisco Province intends to create a link between missionary animation and social communication by addressing the theme of proclaiming the Gospel in the world of social media."

02/28/2022

Michael Rua, born in Torino on 9 June 1837, met don Bosco in September 1845, at age 8. He would begin to frequent Don Bosco's youth center, the Oratory of St Francis de Sales, with his older brother. At age 17 he would move into the Oratory hostel to help Don Bosco run programs for the growing population of poor youth, while at the same time beginning studies for the priesthood. Rua was among the first to join Don Bosco when he founded the Salesian Society on 18 December 1859; he was ordained 28 July 1860, and succeeded Don Bosco as head of the Salesian Family on 31 January 1888.

It was Don Rua who sent the Salesians to North America. The first group of missionaries arrived in the USA at San Francisco on Friday, 11 March 1897, and immediately assumed the direction of SS Peter & Paul Church in North Beach.

Michael Rua, the first successor of St John Bosco, died in Torino on 6 April 1910. He was beatified by St Paul VI on 29 October 1972.