Abidjan, 07 December, 2023 / 9:38 pm (ACI Africa).
Pope Francis has faulted the culture of “selective and elitist” training that focuses on the intellect.
In his message to participants in the four-day first African Congress of Catholic Education that kicked off on Thursday, December 7 in the economic capital city of Ivory Coast, Abidjan, the Holy Father “welcomes the African Education Pact”, which was presented to him in June, and goes on to advocate for the formation of the “whole person”.
“Africa is not immune to the crisis that the education system is going through today, which, as in many places, has become too selective and elitist … aiming to form the intellect alone and not the whole person,” Pope Francis says in his message that the Secretary of State, Pietro Cardinal Parolin, signed, referencing the Holy Father’s address to the participants at the World Congress on Education on 21 November 2015.
Inspired by the Global Compact on Education, a pact meant to encourage positive change in education across the world, the African Education Pact seeks to educate young people based on both Christian values and traditional African culture. The aim is to recover and enhance interpersonal relationships with a communitarian dimension while strengthening the relationship with God.
In his December 7 message, Cardinal Parolin says, “His Holiness Pope Francis joins with you in heart and mind as you gather for the first African Catholic Education Congress to receive the African Education Pact. The Pope is pleased to know that this Educational Pact, which you presented to him on 1 June at the Vatican, was not the end of work undertaken for many years by the Fondation Internationale Religions et Sociétés, but that it marked a new stage in your commitment to promoting education in Africa.”