Rome (Italy). On February 4, 2019, the Rector Major, Fr. Ángel Fernández Artime, officially welcomed into the Salesian Family, the Institute of the Religious of the Sisters, Mediators of Peace – IRIMEP. It is the 32nd group recognized by the SF.
The Institute was founded in 1968 by Msgr. Antonio Campelo, Salesian and Archbishop of Petrolina (State of Pernambuco, Brazil) and in 1984, the Sisters Mediators of Peace, religious belonging to the Institutes of Consecrated Life of Diocesan Right, formally ask to enter to be a part of the Salesian Family.
In 1986, Fr. Egidio Viganó, then the Rector Major, responding to a letter of these sisters, wrote: “I rejoice at your presence in the Church and I join in congratulations for the progress you have made, (in waiting) that this stage of the experience end with the best results”.
Currently, there are actually 70 religious in the Institute, assisted by around 300 collaborators who share with the sisters the pastoral and social-educational mission.
Fr. Joan Lluis Playá, who visited some of the social works that the Sisters Mediators of Peace have developed in Brazil, recalling the words, “From Don Bosco comes a vast movement of peoples who in various ways, work for the salvation of the young”, confirms that this Institute “shares the mission of Don Bosco to work for the poor, the abandoned, people at risk, in areas of extreme poverty”.
The Decree that reports this decision arrived following the request of Sr. Lucia Barbosa de Oliveira, General Coordinator of IRIMEP and after the positive opinion expressed by the General Council of the respective Bishops and the Provincial of Brazil-Recife.
