Troska o wychowanie nowych pokoleń. Benedykt XVI o potrzebie wychowania

Abstract

Pedagogical reflection is accompanied from the start by the conviction that upbringing is an art and requires a particular kind of sensitivity, innovation in action and creative engagement. Upbringing today is upbringing in a society that is diverse, wavering, full of tension, and in which there are many opportunities for choice, great personal responsibility, with life chances, but also with many dangers. This is why an authentic upbringing requires, above all, a closeness and trust which brings love, a first and fundamental experience which is, or at least which ought to be, parents’ love for the child. The upbringer, thus, stands in a relationship to the upbringee as to a person, and not a material which may be freely formed. Upbringing itself aims at the future positive development of the child which will enable him/her to realize his/her “potential”, shape his/her will and develop as an “inimitable person” both in the individual and social sense. The “realization of the individual” which takes place during upbringing leaves space for hope. In the promise and hope the future interacts with human life even now, and by the same token shows the sense behind upbringing. From the perspective of “Christian realism” it is emphasized that the individual always finds himself or herself in a certain “existential situation”. Thus, upbringing is not merely a dialogue and a relationship between people, but also a real relationship with God. It is God who comes to meet the individual in history and who gives him/her the unfailing promise of total fulfilment (joy, a sense of life). In this view, the building of a future (a community) through respecting the natural laws and fundamental freedoms of peoples and nations is also a sign of hope.