There are well over 300 Salesian High Schools across Europe and thirteen Salesian Universities. Belgium alone has 33 Salesian Schools and I haven't been able to count the number of primary schools.
The scale of this network across Europe was brought home to me forcefully when I was invited to meet with the European Commission for Salesian Schools in Rome in October. The time and the place were not an accident. We were to take part in the church-wide celebration of Catholic Education which is part of the jubilee year of the church.

In his words Pope Leo XIV presented St. John Henry Newman as a co-patron of Catholic Education alongside St Thomas Aquinas. The next day we returned to the square to hear John Henry Newman declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Leo XIV. In these days Pope Leo XIV recommended that educators recommit themselves to the Global Educational Compact which was disrupted by the arrival of COVID, he spoke about Don Bosco and the Preventive System of education as a gift to the whole church. Speaking from his own Augustinian tradition Pope Leo emphasised four qualities of a Catholic Education: Interiority, Unity, Love and Joy. I couldn't help but see these as another expression of Don Bosco's fourfold approach to education as: Home (Love), School (Unity), Playground (Joy), and Church (Interiority).

I came away convinced that our Salesian way of life and of educating was close to the heart of the church and the Gospel. I was also uplifted by the family spirit of the European Salesian Commission members with whom I shared some lovely pasta and a very nice red wine and inspiring words.

Text and Images provided by Fr David O'Malley SDB