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Salesian seeks work in unstable area

Fr. Mike Mendi, S.d.b.

Salesian Brother Minh Duc Dang (kneeling), makes his perpetual profession with Fr. Steve Shafran (seated), provincial, as Fr. James Heuser (standing, center) witnesses.

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Brother Minh Duc Dang, a native of Vietnam whose family immigrated to the United States in 1992 and joined Church of the Nativity in Burke, pronounced a perpetual vow of obedience, poverty and chastity Aug. 9.

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Salesian Brother Minh Duc Dang, a native of Vietnam whose
family immigrated to the United States in 1992 and joined
Church of the Nativity in Burke, pronounced a perpetual vow
of obedience, poverty and chastity Aug. 9. He pledged
himself, in the words of the formula of religious profession,
“to devote all my strength to those to whom (God the Father)
will send me, especially to young people who are poorer; to
live in the Salesian Society in communion of spirit and
action with my brothers; and in this way to share in the life
and mission of (God’s) church.”

Brother Minh’s parents, Thuy Van Dang and Tin Thi Do, attend
Mass at Holy Martyrs of Vietnam Church in Arlington. He is
the second-youngest of nine siblings.

The Mass of Perpetual Profession took place at the Marian
Shrine Chapel in Haverstraw, N.Y., with Father Steve Shafran,
provincial, presiding and receiving the vows in the name of
the rector major of the Salesians of St. John Bosco. Another
40 Salesian priests and brothers took part in the Mass, along
with seven Salesian sisters, 14 Salesian Lay Missioners, as
well as family and friends.

Brother Minh started college at the University of Illinois in
Champaign-Urbana but transferred to Seton Hall University in
South Orange, N.J., in 2006 after entering the Salesian
formation program. He earned his bachelor’s in philosophy in
2007. He completed his novitiate at St. Joseph’s Novitiate
attached to Holy Rosary Church in Port Chester, N.Y., and
made his first profession of religious vows Aug. 16, 2009. He
became a Salesian, he says, because he wanted to bring Christ
to others.

Returning to Orange for two years of postnovitiate formation,
he worked toward a master’s in education at Seton Hall. He
taught freshman theology at Don Bosco Preparatory High School
in Ramsey, N.J., 2011-13.

In 2013, his application as a volunteer for the foreign
missions was accepted by the rector major. A former member of
the New Rochelle Province, he was incardinated in the Middle
East Province. He is about to start his third year as a
student of theology at the Ratisbonne Institute in Jerusalem
while also working at the Salesian youth center in Bethlehem.
He said he is studying Arabic, too, so that he might “work
with people who have been displaced by war, especially
children,” in that “unstable and volatile” part of the world.
He retains his aspiration to “be a witness of Christ to
others.”

Brother Minh credits Father Richard B. Martin, the former
pastor of Nativity who died last year, and an aunt, Sister
Binh, with encouraging a religious vocation. Among the
Salesians, he found a good many “witnesses of joy, patience
and love.”

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