“We need to change” the way we think, which is too economy-oriented and technocratic, and bring back the dream of a truly shared future and the primeval enthusiasm”. These are the words of Jean-Dominique Durand, a historian from the University of Lyons, in an online release tonight on SIR Europa (old.agensir.it), about the "crisis" of identity and contents that Europe is going through. "Despite the success stories of the last fifty-five years (European space, common market, European economy and currency, European airplane, European communication network, European rocket and satellites), Europe – notes Durand has not been made, and European citizens remain a mirage”. The inability “to bring together the two souls of the continent, the western one and the eastern one” is, according to the historian, the reason for “the crisis of the pro-European idea, which raised its head last spring with the failure of the referendum in France and Holland”, and which is “a deep identity crisis” marked by a "return to nationalism, or actually to tribalism”. The deadlock was occasioned by "the inability to define what the European citizen is, and the basic values on which the European civilisation is grounded” as indicated by John Paul II in his frequent reminders about the importance "of recognising the Christian roots of the continent". In recalling "the joy, the enthusiasm and the confidence in the future" of the founding fathers, Durand concluded: “We need to change some way of living, which is too economy-oriented and technocratic, and bring back the dream of a truly shared future, and the primeval enthusiasm”.
