Interview with Ms. Norma Cristina Oviedo - Argentina
Patagonia, Argentina, 26 January 2019 -- Tell us about the life of the Provincial Coordinator of the Salesian Cooperators in Patagonia?
Until recently I was fully involved in Salesian education as Principal of one schools in Trelew, Patagonia - Southern Argentina. Now I am already retired, so i have more time to visit and assist the specific local ASC centre in our large territory. These visit are very appreciated, since there was no chance to make them in the past. Due to the large distances we often have virtual meetings of the provincial council, only rarely we can meet all together.
How are the Salesian Cooperators in Patagonia being formed?
In the past each local centre was just reporting to the provincial council about their economy (budget) and simple evaluation of their 'activities', but there was no progress, no shared journey in vocation growth! At present we request each local centre to make their own formation plan according their needs. Last November 2018, just after the 5th ASC Congress in Rome, we held a Provincial ASC Congress focused on formation and next May 19, 2019 we are planning the first provincial encounter of 18-30 year old aspirants in order to rejuvenate our Association. In fact during the last 3 years our province invested a lot into formation renewal, supported by our Regional resources (Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile).
What were the steps taken for your formation program and method for renewal?
The first year (2015-2016) we did an evaluation of our situation, a kind of SWOT and we discovered three main challenges: (1) How do we live our call - vocation, asking ourselves 'Why did we make the promise?' (2) We questioned our visibility. How are we visible in the Church and society? (3) What attracts our aspirants to the Salesian Cooperator vocation? - and really no attractive proposals were offered. We recognized that we were tired, there were some dead structures, large distances (hundreds of km) among our centres prevented our animation, many centres with no aspirants. And we questioned our vocation attractiveness.
The second year (2017) we put all our energies into study and formative reflection. We studied the main SDB and Church documents - The Charter of Identity of the SF, Project of Apostolic life (PAL), The Joy of the Gospel (Pope Francis) and bits and pieces of other Catholic Church magisterium.
The third year (2018) was dedicated to making some major choices: focus on Jesus Christ, focus on the Young and focus on the Mission! Each centre was requested to put these priorities at the top of their concrete lines of action in their local context. After these three years of renewal most of our local centres became more responsible for their own formation and mission.
And how is your own local centre in Trelew?
In our local centre in Trelew there are 7 members with promise and 4 new aspirants in formation. Our Cooperators are involved in the formation of formators, of leaders in the Oratory and the Salesian Parish (Salesian Youth Movement and Exploradores Don Bosco who are the local scout movement). And we have also our outreach Oratory in the quite poor and difficult district of San Cayetano.
