Rome (Italy) On 14 May 2020, Pope Francis invited representatives of the main Religions, representatives of international bodies, and various humanitarian institutions from the world of academia, economics, politics, and culture to the Vatican in Rome for the world event “Rebuilding the Global Compact on Education.” Together, representing the inhabitants of the Earth, they will sign the Global Compact on Education, a global education compact that everyone will undertake to implement within their sphere and to spread as much as possible.
The invitation and the motivation for the event are in the Message of Pope Francis for the launch of the Global Compact on Education of September 12, 2019:
“In my Encyclical Laudato Si’, I invited everyone to cooperate in caring for our common home and to confront together the challenges that we face. Now, a few years later, I renew my invitation to dialogue on how we are shaping the future of our planet and the need to employ the talents of all, since all change requires an educational process aimed at developing a new universal solidarity and a more welcoming society…Never before has there been such need to unite our efforts in a broad educational alliance, to form mature individuals capable of overcoming division and antagonism, and to restore the fabric of relationships for the sake of a more fraternal humanity.”
In preparation for this event, the Faculty of Educational Sciences of the Salesian Pontifical University (UPS) and the Pontifical Faculty of Educational Sciences ‘Auxilium’ of Rome convene, for 22 February 2020, a Forum for dialogue and comparison between generations on the “Global Compact on Education”, which will be held in the headquarters of the National Work for the “Children of the city” of Rome.
The invitation is addressed to young people and adults, families, young couples, animators, volunteers belonging to associations, students of Universities, of the Second Year of High Schools, of Professional Formation Courses, Teachers of schools of every kind and level, University Docents, Educators, to renew “the passion for a more open and inclusive education, capable of patient listening, constructive dialogue, and mutual understanding” (.id)
The proposal of UPS and of the ‘Auxilium’ Faculty is that of reflecting together, young people and adults, starting from the three generative values for an evangelical humanity in solidarity to weave alliances and open paths of life.
The three generative values recall the attitudes to support the building of relationships, of global educational alliances: unconditional listening, trust in inter-generational dialogue, reciprocity.
WE ARE: Young people and adults choose to be there firsthand, not to keep out of the course of global, local, personal history. Without a project there is no choice, there is no life, there is no future.
WE SHARE: Share and participate. Dialogue is essential to build the ‘culture of encounter’, to change the model of global development, to redefine progress, to redirect globalization towards relationality.
WE CARE: Be involved. The interaction of the peoples of the planet calls us to act so that integrations will come in solidarity with/between generations, between genders, between peoples, today and for tomorrow, for the future citizens of the planet.
The Forum, which starts with the conviction that educating is always a choral work in synergy, articulated in three stages: in dialogue groups of ‘belonging’, in groups of ‘moderate comparison’, in general assembly. The aim of the Forum is to draft together, young people and adults, an ‘education compact’ that gathers the indications and the syntheses of the focus groups.
