Winter meeting of Rector - Japan Province

By Our Own Correspondent

Tokyo, Japan, 25 November 2017 -- Two days (November 24-25) winter meeting of 14 Salesian SDB rectors was held this time in the SITEC (Suginami - Tokyo) with the animating presence of the EAO regional councilor and presided by the Provincial, Fr. Mario Yananouchi and five members of his Provincial council. Fr. Klement during this initial intervention challenged all present with a question about personal accompaniment of the confreres, a crucial attitude for the charismatic growth of our communities.

One year after the extraordinary visitation of 2016 the Province of Japan embarked on the journey of consistent reshaping of Salesian presences with the help of the 'Project Team' advisory council, that is meeting twice a month for the reflection and suggests the action steps to the Provincial council. The 8 point scheme for the reshaping becomes the working method. Most of the time was dedicated to the discussion about the process how to form and give concrete leadership responsibilities to the lay mission partners, like principal in the school, social work or kindergarten. During the successive meeting of principals and supervisors of the schools were discerned already two most feasible pilot projects. First province-wide formation meeting of the Lay Mission partners is scheduled already for January 8, 2018.

Under the OPP 2016 the Japan province aims to become more a province for the poor young people. During a break time the rectors and councilors have direct contact with the staff and 35 students of the 'Free School' who are from multi-cultural families, mainly from Nepal, China and South Asian countries (Tabunka NPO with15 teachers and 20 volunteers: http://tabunka.or.jp/en/project/freeschool that is hosted within the SITEC complex of Suginami Salesian house. Each local community is doing small steps towards the poor youth.

Wonderful family spirit was experience during joint prayers, celebration of the Eucharist in the chapel of Suginami Salesian parish church, during outing dinner concluded with the 'Gospel Magic' of Fr. Mickey Muramatsu.

Looking already towards the next school year 2018-2019, the rectors discussed also the Strenna 2018 with the related poster 'made in Japan', shared the challenges in their SEPP (Salesian Educative Pastoral Plan) and exchanged information about current issues in each local community. The province of Japan has at present 14 canonical communities and was happy to welcome recently two young missionaries sent by the Rector Major - Cl. Jeswin from India and Cl. Abuto from Kenya.

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