Numerous events  with the patronage of the President of the Italian Republic

Rome (Italy), March 21 (VID) - There are numerous events which have been planned to make the third centennial of the arrival of the first Brothers of Christian Schools in Italy. In the autumn of 1702, as a matter of fact, the first two missionaries arrived in Rome, having been sent by the founder of the Congregation to also make the new pedagogical experience which arose in France known to Rome. The school in Rome was the first Lasallian school founded out of the country of origin.

The tri-centennial year, among other things, precisely in these days has acquired the patronage of the President of the Italian Republic, which is granted for initiatives of particular social, religious and humanitarian relevance. Brother Mario Presciuttini, the Visitor of the Roman Province, furthermore made it known that a special audience will be granted by the Pope to the Brothers of Christian Schools on May 18th, which moreover falls on the day of the 82nd birthday of the Pope himself. "All the initiatives which are already underway or in the pipeline at the level of Italian religious Provinces of individual educational institutions shall be structured - Brother Presciuttini pointed out - around this great appointment and its profound symbolic meaning."

In November a study convention was held on Brother Gabriel Drolin, one of the first two Lasallians who arrived in Italy, while in March an international seminar of the volunteer workers took place. In April there will instead be a presentation of a volume on Gabriel Drolin "A Lasallian Between Silence and Memory", while in May a commemorative ceremony has been set in the Capital Hill, the seat of the Commune of Rome, and the laying of a memorial plaque in the headquarters of the first Lasallian school a in Italy, in the historical center.

The Italian Lasallian Family will be instead be at a congress at the end of August, for a verification of these three hundred years of presence, while the official public commemoration has been set for the month of November, with a rich series of cultural events and the proclamation of the winners of the contest which the has involved the various schools managed by the religious.

"The individual local initiatives of the Lasallian institutions, - points out Brother Presciuttini -" which are not less rich in significance and which are of great value as witness bearing, have been meshed into the fabric of this rich program in order to vivaciously confirm a glorious history which is still underway".