Karol Wojtyła as a model of a mature educator in the light of the concept of Zdzisław Chlewiński

Abstract

The theme of the paper centres around role models in values education. The purpose of this paper is to answer the following research question: how was the model maturity of Karol Wojtyła as an educator manifested? Reference was made to the concept of mature personality by Zdzisław Chlewiński (1991), who listed three criteria for maturity: personal (personalistic) attitude towards another person, autonomy, and reliable insight into oneself. The results of the analysis showed that Karol Wojtyła’s maturity manifested itself in an exemplary fulfilment of the aforementioned criteria, as demonstrated by examples from his life and teaching. Emphasis was placed on Wojtyła’s authenticity as an educator who not only brought others up to maturity, but was also truly mature himself. Perfect correspondence between his life and teaching was emphasised as well. The author has used Wojtyła’s biographies. Among the numerous studies and source texts on Wojtyła’s life and teaching, those were selected that pertained to the determinants of maturity detailed by Chlewiński. The focus was on the adolescence and early youth of the future Pope John Paul II. Chlewiński’s concept appears as a concise, coherent approach that can be used in subsequent analyses of the life and teaching of truly mature people.