Hajja Salesjana January March 2018

27 Other such projects, at various times, were also proposed to the Salesians in Zejtun, Senglea and Tarxien but were not taken up due to a lack of personnel. In 1940, the second world war broke out in Malta when Italy and England were enemies, Malta being a British colony. This was the time for the Salesian Superiors in Turin to make a final and decisive move about which province should take the responsibility for the two Salesian communities in Malta. And so it was in that year that the Rector Major, Fr. Peter Ricaldone, decided that the two Salesian houses of Malta should belong to the English Province, with Fr. Eneas Tozzi, Provincial of England, responsible for both of them. The situation remained like that until 1974. In 1949, the first Salesian house was opened in our sister island Gozo. It was Don Bosco’s Oratory in Victoria, prepared for the Salesians by a diocesan priest, Fr. Paul Micallef. Many vocations came from this Oratory of Gozo. In 1965 we left Gozo due to a shortage of personnel yet the Salesian presence there continues to be felt to this day. In 1949, the first issue of the Salesian Bulletin was published in Maltese under the title ‘Dun Bosco f’Malta’ (Don Bosco in Malta). It is now called ‘Il-Hajja Salesjana’ (The Salesian Life). In 1954, the Rector of St. Patrick’s, Fr. Patrick McLoughlin, was appointed as a Provincial Representative in Malta, but this was not exactly the role of the Provincial Delegate as was later described in the new Salesian Constitutions promulgated by the Rector Major Fr. Aloysius Ricceri in 1972. In fact, Fr. McLoughlin died in 1962 and no successor was appointed. In 1963, with the help of Miss Olympia Bondí, whose parents were Salesian Cooperators in Gozo, the first three Salesian Sisters arrived in Gozo. Later, Sr. Rose Oliveri became superior. Vocations came and the Sisters opened houses in Victoria, Ghasri and Marsalforn. In 1965, the Salesians in Malta took the keys of a house at 10, St. John Bosco Street, Sliema, left to them in the will of Miss Mary Asphar, the sister of the wife of Alphonsus Maria Galea. This house is now the House of the Provincial Delegate.