The passion for education

Reviving the “passion for education” in Christian communities: the appeal was made by Benedict XVI in his address to the Italian bishops, whom he met in the Synodal Hall in the Vatican on 27 May. The bishops were gathered there for the General Assembly of the Italian Bishops’ Conference. The Italian Church has decided to dedicate its pastoral guidelines for the next decade to the educational challenge, and it was just to this question that the Pope devoted his address. Closeness, loyalty, trust. “A mistaken idea of autonomy”, “scepticism”, “relativism”: “though conscious of the burden of these impediments – said the Holy Father -, we cannot succumb to mistrust or resignation. Educating has never been easy, but we must not give up”. “Let us rather revive in our communities the passion for education that is not reduced to didacticism, to a sum of techniques, or even the transmission of arid principles. Educating means forming the new generations, so that they may know how to enter into rapport with the world, strong in a significant memory”. Youth are close to the Holy Father’s heart. “The thirst that the young bear in their hearts – he said – is a thirst for the meaning of life and for genuine human relations that may help them not to feel alone when faced by the challenges of life”. Youth have a need for “a safe and reliable company that approaches each person with delicacy and respect, and proposes solid values on the basis of which they can grow towards high though never attainable goals”. That’s why the Christian proposal is mediated “through relations of closeness, loyalty and trust”. The Pope then encouraged the bishops to make an effort to “meet” youth, to go towards them, “to frequent the environments in which they live, including that consisting of the new technologies of communication that now permeate our culture in all its forms of expression. That does not mean adjusting the Gospel to the world – said the Pope -, rather it means drawing from the Gospel the perennial Good News which permits man in every age to find the forms best suited to preaching the imperishable Word, and so enriching and serving human existence”.The responsibility of adults. The theme of education was also touched on by Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, President of the Italian Bishops’ Conference (CEI), in his keynote address. “A generation of adults who do not shirk their responsibilities needs to be fostered – he said -, so that they be willing to put themselves on the line, cherish the qualifying and defining choices in life, and grasp – they first of all – the radical difference between living and partly living”. In the Cardinal’s view, we are “now in a situation in which the absence of values immediately – without any intermediate stages – results in personal distress if not in social disintegration. But let us beware lest in contexts of this kind, which seem to be in expansion, merely disciplinary or emergency responses are proposed; the challenge of education does not admit surrogates: if it is abandoned, it is the community itself which – in segments – is decomposed. That means that our commitment to education – of which the pastoral guidelines for the next decade must be an exemplary expression – is something decisive not only from the evangelical and hence ecclesial, but also from the historical, social and political viewpoint”.Investing our best energies in education. The field of education – said Archbishop Cesare Nosiglia, Vice-President of the CEI, speaking with journalists – represents for any country “its most productive goldmine from which to draw and from which to start out anew”. For “it is on education that the future of a society is predicated, and we know very well that a country’s economic growth itself increases in proportion to the investment it has made in education”. “We consider – said the archbishop – that this is an issue that concerns and involves society as a whole, because it invests families, parishes and schools”. And he added: “The investment of sufficient personnel, resources and means to achieve the goals of education represents both for the Church and for society the primary and indispensable commitment that cannot be shirked or belittled by other fields of work in the economic and social field, however necessary”. “What’s at stake – said Archbishop Nosiglia – is the conservation and renewal of our heritage of knowledge, culture and life, enriched with human, spiritual, moral, religious and civil values and with the input of the men and women who have embodied them with genius”. “I think – he continued – that the Church in Italy with this decade-long commitment clearly indicates to herself but also to the country where the compass of its progress and future needs to be pointed”. And she does so addressing herself to families, to civil realities and to Christian communities. “Not least she addresses herself to the political, cultural, economic and social institutions, so that they may invest their best energies in this field which represents the beating heart of the country”. “The present and future of the country’s future are at stake in it. We must each make our own contribution. Each is asked to give of his best”.