St. Joseph's SALESIAN Youth Retreat Center

A Salesian retreat center is a center of popular spirituality, which can be of considerable importance in evangelization and in the process of education to the faith of the people and also of the young.

Many of the centers of spirituality in our care are significant centers for the development and experience of salesian spirituality: centers for the spreading of Marian devotion, like the Sanctuary of Mary Help of Christians at Turin and very many others all over the world; places of communication and sharing of the salesian spirit through the figure of Don Bosco; centers of revitalization of Christian life through the liturgy, the Eucharist, the sacrament of Reconciliation, and prayer; reference points and places of pilgrimage for individuals and groups, large and small.

This means that we must see to it that the work of retreats and spiritual renewal is of high quality and based on a pastoral project, which is strongly motivated and effective for the evangelization of people in general and of youth groups in particular. The following are important components of a center of renewal and spirituality:

• the quality of the welcome given, which gives to those who are estranged from religion the possibility that they will be listened to, understood, and encouraged to develop the seed of faith which has led them to the retreat center;
• a strong proposal of evangelization, which opens visitors to a meeting with Jesus Christ and his Gospel through an experience of conversion; for this, time and possibility for prayer and the sacraments, especially reconciliation;
• opportunity for dialogue and serious spiritual follow-up; the retreat become an important means for the Christian maturing of many youngsters in their vocational search;
• a dynamic and creative synthesis between evangelical quality and the language and sensitivity of popular devotion; between religious practice and the preoccupations, hopes and needs of the family and of the communal and social lives of the people.

"Remember that education is a matter of the heart."

--St. John Bosco (Don Bosco)

"It is not enough that you love the young; they must know that they are loved."

--St. John Bosco (Don Bosco)