“New things” for the family

The Social Weeks “are meant to be a high-profile cultural and ecclesial initiative, capable of addressing – and if possible anticipating – the radical questions and challenges brought to the fore with the evolution of societies” (1).  Corresponding topical issues will be delved into during the 47th Social Week of Italian Catholics that will be held in Turin September 12-15 2013, titled “The family, hope and future of Italian society”, a central theme in people’s lives and for the common good of the Country. It had already been included in the agenda proposed during the Social Week of Reggio Calabria in 2010, whose topical relevance is reflected in ongoing debates at institutional level, and in the very progress of events. On the agenda of the meeting (promoting, educating, including, prompting social mobility, completing institutional transition), the family has always been the protagonist for the future, capable of untangling the knots that prevent the growth of our Country. Thence emerged the need to put the family at the centre in continuity with previous reflections, with the purpose of placing urgent issues experienced by the national community within the framework of the common good. With a view to carrying out a permanent quest of the common good, the family holds a special significance, as it involves the anthropological knots that are crucial for the integrity and the future of the human person; it constitutes a fundamental pillar for the building of a truly free civil society that gives space to the freedom of religion and education. It is therefore a preliminary condition for the establishment of a society where the rights of each and every person are truly respected. The theme of the family – and the role it has played and continues to play at the very heart of our society – calls into question also various economic aspects and it prompts us to address them in the prospect of the primacy of the human person. In addition to these reasons, the family emerges as a cornerstone also in the assumption of the task indicated in the Pastoral Guidelines “Educating for the good life of the Gospel”, which states: “On the horizon of the Christian community the family remains the first and indispensable educating community. For parents, education is a primary obligation, as it is linked to the transmission of life. It is the original and primary respect of the commitment to education; irreplaceable and inalienable, in the sense that it cannot be delegated nor surrogated” (2). Mindful of these aspects, the meeting in Turin will address the theme of the family within the framework of the Social Week, which means, for example, to acknowledge the hardships and the hopes present within the daily lives of many families; to recognize the family as the natural and irreplaceable realm for the generation and the regeneration of the human person, of society and of its evolution, not only in material and civil terms, but also in moral and spiritual ones; to ensure concrete closeness and to be perceived as such by the families – parents and children alike – who suffer for various reasons; to underline the words contained in our Constitution that describe the family as an institution based on the marriage of a man and a woman; to recognize and protect at all times and in all circumstances the rights of the children; to highlight the existing bond between the “favor familiae”, the common good, and the country’s development, overcoming prejudice and ideologies, in order to enhance widely shared motivations that go beyond cultural and religious positions and stances. The purpose of the Social Week is to promote a critical and propositional approach to such a vast and challenging theme; to raise a debate and provide the keys so that everyone, believers and non-believers alike, encouraged by these reflections, may commit themselves for a truly choral discernment for the defence and the promotion of the family, determined to trigger “new things”, fruit of a positive change and thrust of organic and consistent policies.(*) general secretary Italian Bishops’ Conference(1) ITALIAN BISHOPS’ CONFERENCE, Pastoral Letter Recovery and renewal of the Social Weeks of Italian Catholics, November 20 1988, no.5: ECEI 4/1314.(2) ITALIAN BISHOPS’ CONFERENCE, Educating for the Good Life of the Gospel. Pastoral Guidelines of the Italian Episcopate for the decade 2010-2020, October 4, 2010 no.27: ECEI 8/3790.