Humanism gets a bad name in some Christian circles, but looking to the very basics of who we are isn’t a bad thing at all:
334. In its schools the Church is called to promote an education centered on the human person who is capable of living in community, and making his or her contribution to its well being.
The Aparecida bishops preach no prejudice, either economic or cultural:
Given the fact that many are excluded, the Church must press for quality formal and informal education for all, especially for the poorest. That means an education that brings children, youth, and adults into encounter with the cultural values of their own country, discovering or integrating the religious and transcendent dimension into those values.
I read this advice as endorsing what those of us in the North have termed campus ministry:
To that end, we need a dynamic pastoral ministry of education to accompany education processes, to be a voice legitimizing and safeguarding freedom of education vis-Ã -vis the state and the right to a quality education of the most dispossessed.
How do you read this?
For deeper examination, an English translation of the 2007 document from the Aparecida Conference.
Catholic Sensibility 