LaSan schools, rather activity centers
of the District of Vietnam after '75

Right after the fall of Saigon in '75, all twenty seven establishments of the LaSan Education System were to be "so-called offered" to the new government of Hanoi who just re-confirmed that "what is offered, is offered!"

Somehow, the disciples of Saint De La Salle, so deeply inspired by their Founder's Spirit, have been able to find ways to serve poor people wherever and whenever they can. Brother Simeon has very well presented this "spirit of faith and zeal" as folows:

LASAN  BROTHERS  IN  VIETNAM
EMBRACING THE CORE MISSION.
Presented at the Convocation of the District of San Francisco,
by Brother Simeon, fsc

First we are profoundly grateful to the Divine Providence for having put us in a privileged situation - though not always clearly perceived as such - to carry out the core lasallian mission, that of "giving Christian education to the poor." This should be seen as a real bliss for us, and through the eye of faith we can identify greater opportunity and stronger motivation for us to live out our lasallian vocation.

Being devoid of schools and all their infrastructure enables us to devote more of our time and effort to embrace straightforwardly the lasallian "principal function" of evangelization and catechesis. Thus, we have been trying to respond to one of the most urgent needs of our youth, the one that is deliberately ignored. Meanwhile, in terms of poor, we are fully immersed in the world of the poor. Those most beloved children of God are right at our door, we do not have to reach out.

Our mission is mainly focused on the following sectors:
· Catechesis
· Remedial/vocational education
· Formation/permanent formation (of Brothers)

Our work is characterized by quasi-gratuity, flexibility, and abandon to God.

CATECHESIS

Almost all our Brothers, even those in their eighties, are directly involved in catechesis. This have been done in various ways such as:
· Catechism in parochial churches
· Catechist training
· YCS movement

and, sometimes, in an ingenious way: Bible sharing in English or French, for example, is such a "trick" of combination of studying the Holy Scripture and practicing a foreign language.

To go catechesis, the Brothers have to go into a real conversion. Our mathematicians and scientists had to put aside their formulas and go digging into Paulian epistles. The results show that they have been successful.

To cope with the lack of updated learning /teaching materials, brother Alloysius, a former mathematics teacher now in his eighties, has labored in writing textbooks and workbooks for those religious classes. His series of materials proved to be efficient and was quite widely used.

Catechist training constitutes our main effort. Where ever possible we stage training sessions to help those volunteer catechists refresh their religious knowledge and learn more appropriate ways to present it to their disciples. Young lasallian scholastics are very active in this sector. Many catechist rallies have been held in Maithon. Twice have a group of them gone on an exposure to CaMau, the southmost rural province of Vietnam where the means of transport is nothing but boat. The enthusiasm and eagerness shown in their reports betrayed their success and also their readiness to return to those remote and deprived swamps.

Somehow different from the common practice in western countries - all the above works are gratuitous. We are happy that they are as they were in the Founder’s time: beneficiaries have nothing to pay for their religious instruction.

REMEDIAL VOCATIONAL EDUCATION

To address the problem of inefficient teaching in public schools and also to earn some income for the community budget, most of our Brothers are involved in
· Tutorial lessons
· Boarding houses
· Language/Vocational centers

Tutorial lessons are given mostly in the community precincts. Parents are happy and confident to entrust their children to the Brothers’ care. Various are the subject matters, large is the range of age and, especially, flexible are the schedules. Brother Victor, for example, is able to set up a system of remedial classes amounting to 700 schoolchildren in Hue with the help of some volunteers and lasallian aspirants.

To have safe and favorable environment for their study, students or schoolboys from the provinces resort to the Brothers. Almost all our communities state in their Community Annual Projects their will to spare their space to set up and take care of boarding houses. Some 200 are currently accommodated in our communities. Many new lasallian recruits also come from this "nurseries."

We also managed to get official license for some of our language and computer centers. Up to now, thousands have got their certificates of English or computer skills and aimed with them, many of our learners were able to find quite choice jobs.

Parallelly, with the support of friends and former students, vocational classes for street or disabled children have been set up. Those zero-fee woodcarving and cycle-mechanic training courses help gird them with skills to earn honestly a living on their own.

LASALLIAN FORMATION

Fully aware of the fact that a good number of young people still want to join us, and realizing our own responsibility for the vitality of the Institute, the District Chapter has set up an aggressive plan of formation:
· Formation houses
· Formation staff and programs
· Vietnamization of lasallian writings

Communities with existing boarding houses are given the task of nurturing aspirants until they are mature enough to join the postulancy. So together with our Postulancy, and Noviciate, our newly built Scholasticate constitutes a complete formation infrastructure.

The program of formation of aspirants, novices and scholastics is to be duly revised and so that there will be "a complete, comprehensive and updated program of formation." Moreover, a project of formator training and a special status for the Director of Formation are being worked out.

Meanwhile, to help our young Brothers with low mastery of English or French, all the documents from the Generalate have been translated into Vietnamese. A project aiming at providing the Brothers with more Vietnamese versions of lasallian publications is being drafted in view of celebrating the centenary of the canonization of our Founder. This will also serve as an impetus for the permanent formation of the older Brothers.

CHALLENGES

Serious challenges are there waiting for us:
· To be up to the impending tasks we have to improve and update our competence in many aspects. An efficient project of permanent formation should be put into application.
· The lack of competence in foreign language many of our younger Brothers suffer is still to be addressed aggressively.
· Objective difficulties will not disappear tomorrow morning, so the Brothers should aware to strengthen their tenacity in being faithful to their lasallian vocation

HOPE

Not waiting for better working environment, we try to do our most possible making ours the words of our Rule "Despite the difficulties which they meet, the Brothers know, in faith, that God does not abandon his work but that it pleases him, to make it bear fruit day by day." (R. 141)