Vatican City, Jan 23, 2008 / 10:35 am
A letter from the Pope to Catholic administrators, teachers, parents and students was made public today regarding the vital importance of education and its balance of freedom and discipline. The letter comes after some Italian politicians tried to make political capital out of earlier remarks by the Pontiff about an ‘educational emergency’.
In his January 21 letter, Benedict XVI notes that education today “seems to be becoming ever more difficult. ... Hence there is talk of an ‘educational emergency’, confirmed by the failures which too often crown our efforts to form well-rounded individuals, capable of collaborating with others and of giving meaning to their lives.”
The Pontiff points out that educators may feel the “temptation to give up” on education, and even run the risk “of not understanding what their role is,” and he identifies “a mentality and a form of culture that leads people to doubt the value of the human person, the meaning of truth and of good and, in the final analysis, the goodness of life itself.”
These difficulties “are not insurmountable,” Pope Benedict stressed. “Do not be afraid! ... Even the greatest values of the past cannot simply be inherited, we must make them our own and renew them through often-difficult personal choices.”