Michal Vojtáš – Reviving Don Bosco’s oratory. Salesian Youth Ministry, leadership and innovative project management

The “Salesians of Don Bosco” (SDB) are the largest Catholic religious order with a primary focus on youth ministry and education. If we observe its action in synergy with the whole Salesian Family, uniting more than 30 congregations, institutes, associations and movements, we can state that the Salesian Youth Ministry influences millions of young people worldwide through schools, youth centres, parishes, missionary centres, informal activities, volunteering, and animation.

Leadership styles, governance models and project management methodologies are therefore phenomena influencing concretely a vast and diverse educational and pastoral network.

Here I would like to pose that were felt at the beginning of the journey which progresses with this publication: How were the main ideas of the Salesian Youth Ministry, the Leadership models and the Project Management methodologies developed? What was their theoretical background? What is the central idea that organizes the whole system? And, of course, how can we offer better ministry and education for the young of the third millennium?

These fundamental questions, and the respective efforts to answer them, organize the whole
publication.

CONTENTS:

• 1. HISTORICAL EVOLUTION OF THE SALESIAN YOUTH MINISTRY
• 1.1 The Pastoral Echoes of Vatican II in the 19th General Chapter (1965)
• 1.2 The Post-Vatican II and the Special General Chapter (1966-72)
• 1.3 Educative and Pastoral Project Logic of Viganò and Vecchi (1978-90)
• 1.4 Collaboration Youth Ministry Department – UPS (1980-88)
• 1.5 Consolidation of the SEPP (1990-2002)
• 1.6 New Youth Ministry Challenges and Perspectives (2002-2014)
• 2. THEORETICAL BACKGROUNDS OF SALESIAN LEADERSHIP AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT
• 2.1 Curriculum Design Influences (Bobbitt, Tyler, Stenhouse)
• 2.2 Animation as a Theoretical Leadership Model
• 2.3 Management by Objectives and Beyond
• 3. DON BOSCO IN THE ORATORY: PERMANENT RENEWAL CRITERION
• 3.1 Criterion for Vatican II Renewal Needed and Found
• 3.2 Consecrated Life and Organizational Research
• 3.3 Don Bosco’s Leadership and Management
• 3.4 Conclusion: Leadership – Management Synergy in Don Bosco
• 4. INNOVATION OF SALESIAN LEADERSHIP AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT
• 4.1 Dialogue with Organizational Theories
• 4.2 Integral Methodological Framework
• 4.3 Virtues of Salesian Leader-Manager
• 4.4 Process of an Integral and Transformational Project Management
• Appendices
• Indexes
• List Of Schemes
• Bibliography

Reference time period: 1965 – 2014

Reference institution:
Università Pontificia Salesiana (UPS)