Survey
Anniversary of 150 years since the founding ADMA
Dear friends,
next April 18, 2019 marks the anniversary of 150 years since the founding of the Association of Mary Help of Christians wanted by don Bosco to defend the faith of the people, radiating into the world the devotion to Jesus Eucharist and devotion to the Virgin, invoked under the title of Help of Christians.
Don Bosco, in fact, a year after the consecration of the Shrine of Mary Help of Christians, next to the brick building he erected a shrine built with "living stones", founding the Association because he was amazed by the countless graces and miracles that people attributed to the intercession of Mary Help of Christians: "Every corner, every brick of this sacred edifice is a reminder of a benefit, a grace obtained from this august Queen of Heaven”. "Hic domus mea, inde gloria mea": from here radiates the glory of Mary and the action of the whole Salesian Family in the world.
Even today, after such a long time, all of us who we are part of ADMA recognise the grace of God working in us and, grateful, we want to live and promote the love of Jesus in the Eucharist and the devotion to Mary and to cooperate in the mission of Christ for the salvation of the souls. And we do it by putting ourselves at the school of our heavenly mother, trying to imitate her in her attitudes, making us interpreters of the signs of our times and entrusting our steps to Her.
Faith in Jesus Christ and entrustment to Mary Help of Christians urge us to promote evangelisation in the education of young people, in families and in all areas of life, not only with apostolic commitment, but also with a concrete testimony of life, without letting ourselves be deceived by the logic of indifference and selfishness, in a familiar, simple and practical style, according to the spirit of Don Bosco: to tangibly touch Mary’s help in the Church and in our daily experience.
During these first 150 years, our association has spread all over the world, thanks to the generous response of many people who, despite the difficulties and the ups and downs of life, have continued to keep their devotion alive, relying on Mary Help of Christians with simplicity. Today we are more than 100,000, in over 50 countries and with 800 local groups erected and aggregated to ADMA Primaria in Valdocco.
Each group has been able to interpret its own local reality and has been able to "actualise" - in time and space – its fidelity to Don Bosco's charism; so that, while remaining united to the two columns, Jesus Eucharist and Mary Help of Christians, there are many forms in which the charism has materialised and many directions in which the spirit has blown.
Hence the meaning of the short questionnaire that we send you as an attachment here: it would be nice it could be disseminated and compiled by all local Adma groups: TO GET TO KNOW ONE ANOTHER !!!
Precisely on the occasion of the 150th anniversary, we thought it would be nice and important to know one another a bit more, to exchange experiences of life and journeys; to know to whom each group is addressed, how it lives and in which direction it directs its apostolate.
To know ourselves to be a great family under the mantle of Mary, to know one another to support us, to know us in order to remind us that wherever we are in the world - today and in the future - it is the centrality of the relationship with Jesus, which cannot exist without the guidance of Mary, that supports our journey and gathers us together. To recognise that we all want to testimony that faith is a gift which gives meaning and fullness to life and answers to the most profound questions in man.
We would like to gather your feedback and your material to work on it and present it as a "gift" and a result of the association's journey during the upcoming World Congress of Mary Help of Christians, to be held, as you may know, in Argentina, Buenos Aires in November 2019.
We thank you in advance for your help in spreading this initiative, we are sure that this work will be precious for ADMA progress for the next 150 years!!!
next April 18, 2019 marks the anniversary of 150 years since the founding of the Association of Mary Help of Christians wanted by don Bosco to defend the faith of the people, radiating into the world the devotion to Jesus Eucharist and devotion to the Virgin, invoked under the title of Help of Christians.
Don Bosco, in fact, a year after the consecration of the Shrine of Mary Help of Christians, next to the brick building he erected a shrine built with "living stones", founding the Association because he was amazed by the countless graces and miracles that people attributed to the intercession of Mary Help of Christians: "Every corner, every brick of this sacred edifice is a reminder of a benefit, a grace obtained from this august Queen of Heaven”. "Hic domus mea, inde gloria mea": from here radiates the glory of Mary and the action of the whole Salesian Family in the world.
Even today, after such a long time, all of us who we are part of ADMA recognise the grace of God working in us and, grateful, we want to live and promote the love of Jesus in the Eucharist and the devotion to Mary and to cooperate in the mission of Christ for the salvation of the souls. And we do it by putting ourselves at the school of our heavenly mother, trying to imitate her in her attitudes, making us interpreters of the signs of our times and entrusting our steps to Her.
Faith in Jesus Christ and entrustment to Mary Help of Christians urge us to promote evangelisation in the education of young people, in families and in all areas of life, not only with apostolic commitment, but also with a concrete testimony of life, without letting ourselves be deceived by the logic of indifference and selfishness, in a familiar, simple and practical style, according to the spirit of Don Bosco: to tangibly touch Mary’s help in the Church and in our daily experience.
During these first 150 years, our association has spread all over the world, thanks to the generous response of many people who, despite the difficulties and the ups and downs of life, have continued to keep their devotion alive, relying on Mary Help of Christians with simplicity. Today we are more than 100,000, in over 50 countries and with 800 local groups erected and aggregated to ADMA Primaria in Valdocco.
Each group has been able to interpret its own local reality and has been able to "actualise" - in time and space – its fidelity to Don Bosco's charism; so that, while remaining united to the two columns, Jesus Eucharist and Mary Help of Christians, there are many forms in which the charism has materialised and many directions in which the spirit has blown.
Hence the meaning of the short questionnaire that we send you as an attachment here: it would be nice it could be disseminated and compiled by all local Adma groups: TO GET TO KNOW ONE ANOTHER !!!
Precisely on the occasion of the 150th anniversary, we thought it would be nice and important to know one another a bit more, to exchange experiences of life and journeys; to know to whom each group is addressed, how it lives and in which direction it directs its apostolate.
To know ourselves to be a great family under the mantle of Mary, to know one another to support us, to know us in order to remind us that wherever we are in the world - today and in the future - it is the centrality of the relationship with Jesus, which cannot exist without the guidance of Mary, that supports our journey and gathers us together. To recognise that we all want to testimony that faith is a gift which gives meaning and fullness to life and answers to the most profound questions in man.
We would like to gather your feedback and your material to work on it and present it as a "gift" and a result of the association's journey during the upcoming World Congress of Mary Help of Christians, to be held, as you may know, in Argentina, Buenos Aires in November 2019.
We thank you in advance for your help in spreading this initiative, we are sure that this work will be precious for ADMA progress for the next 150 years!!!