Questions posed to schools” “

The problem of the “Christian roots” of Europe also involves the role and tasks of schools. The fact that the draft Constitution of the European Union “forgot” any reference to God and the religious dimension says a good deal about the risk the current generation runs in losing contact with a rich and fruitful heritage of culture, but one which needs to come to terms with the transformations of the present. In other words, the “forgetfulness” may be a symptom of growing inattention or mistaken attention to religious issues, often considered separate from, even extraneous to the complexity of the contemporary situation. It could also be a symptom of an inadequate response to the contribution offered by the thought and witness of the Churches to the European horizon: and the role played by schools in such a response is fundamental. Contemporary society is faced by the task of having to tackle, on the one hand, the results of a long process of secularization, including its alienation from its own roots, and not only its religious roots. These roots have become relativized, watered down in a generalized culture, within which diversities and identities are dissolved and mixed together in the “flat” undifferentiated dimension of the present. On the other hand, this magma in which various symbolic, and also potentially conflictual, worlds are devitalized, is a fertile terrain for minority but potentially explosive fundamentalist claims, boosted among other things by new waves of immigration. It is as if the multicultural dimension that characterizes our society were to be drowned in a mixture in which any common values and horizons are lost because everything has become bloodless or, on the contrary, in a situation in which one part exercises predomination over the rest. Schools have the potential to act as an antidote to these two scenarios. For it is at school that knowledge is transmitted, re-elaborated, deepened and compared. In a European perspective it is absolutely indispensable to reflect on the contents of a school education adequate to the task. And in this process of change, now perceptible and underway, it is essential, too, that schools tackle in a systematic way and without compromise the question of the cultural and religious roots of the peoples of Europe in the past and in the present. The relation between school and religion is indeed in rapid evolution in Europe. The need is being widely expressed, for example, for a form of non-confessional inculturation respectful of religious principles and values. What is needed, in substance, is a “lay” approach to religion, combined with a comparative study of the various religions present in Europe. Interesting, in this regard, is the case of France, which has always been “hostile” to the teaching of religion at school, but which has recently reflected on the need to promote a “lay” knowledge of religious experience. Or we may take the case of Italy, where the long process of debate and discussion that has accompanied and ensued the process of revising the Concordat – in which a decisive part was the redefinition of the teaching of religion – has led to the flourishing of an important reflection on the need for a lay and non-confessional approach to religion at school, supported by valid reasons, both educational and cultural. These two examples ought to guide and illuminate the current debate, emphasizing the importance of transmitting “the cultural and Christian roots” of Europe to the new generations.