Listening Attentively to the MovementMovement of

the Holy Spirit

The Christian and Gratuitous School as a Sign of the Reign

of God

ObjectivesTeaching as vocation; founding a community of religious BrothersBrothers as apostles and ambassadors

The Christian school as creative response to evangelize and catechizeevangelize and catechize the young, especially those who are poor

Teaching as Ministry

Salvation

Two Principal Organizing Concepts in De La Salle’s Theological Pedagogy

is the power to discover and to relate

to Godpresent in our lives,resulting in a qualityof affective presence

that is decisivefor the Reign of God.

is the power to discover and to relate

to Godpresent in our lives,resulting in a qualityof affective presence

that is decisivefor the Reign of God.

Christian spirituality

“To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”

The 17th century was a time of crisis for traditional primary education in France

Claude Joly, Paris’ superintendent of schools resisted the Council of Trent’s reform decrees

Ill-Preparation of male teachers

Le grand chantre lampooned Joly for employing a motley collection of “low pot-house keepers, second-hand shop proprietors, silk-weaver flunkies, wig makers, and marionette string pullers.”

Primary school teachers were under diocesan authority

It was at the end of the first six months and at the beginning of the year 1682 that new candidates appeared… And it was then that a true form of community began to appear in the house. It was also at the beginning of that same year that what were known as exercises began to be practiced, and the teachers were called Brothers.

Canon Blain, CL 4, 47

Creating a distinct identity as Brothers of the Christian SchoolsCommunity…Brothers

This name seemed to them more unassuming and moreappropriate to the common life they had adopted, andmore capable of maintaining the union that reigned among them. All they had became common property, no private interests distracted their minds, and in this way the regularity of their conduct was a vivid image of their life of the first Christians.

Maillfer, CL 6, 54

Creating a distinct identity as Brothers of the Christian Schools

Creating a Distinct Identity as Brothers of the Christian Schools

Christian instruction and a holy education

should be understood places where young people go to learn how to read, write, and count for a fee. By Christian and Gratuitous Schools should be understood places where they go to acquire Christian instruction and a holy education for no payment.

Canon Blain CL 7, 34

Schools

The creative response: the role of the Brothers within the Church

Workers with God

Ministers of Jesus Christ

Builders of the Church

The creative response: the role of the Brothers within the Church

Ministers of Jesus Christ

Since you are ambassadors and ministers of Jesus Christ in the work that you do,

you must act as representing Jesus Christ himself.

He wants your disciples to see him in you and receive your instructions

as if he were instructing them. MTR 195.2

The creative response: the role of the Brothers within the Church

Workers with God

God is so good that…he wills thatall people come to the knowledge of the truth.

This truth is God himself… This is why God wills all people to be instructed,

so that their minds may be enlightened by the light of faith.

MTR 193.1

The creative response: the role of the Brothers within the Church

Builders of the Church

You must show the Church what love you have for her and give proof of your zeal,

since it is for the Church…that you work.

You have become her ministers accordingto the order God has given you

to dispense his word.

MTR 201.2

Who were these children in the first Christian Schools?

the (almost) always poor & the (new) occasionally poor

non-attendance absence and truancy

drop outs

“parents preoccupied…children often left on their own…

being formed by bad companions in the streets”

in need of salvation…salvation from…salvation for…

the reign of god…brothers and sisters of one human family

What made the Christian Schools so unusual and desirable?

Order and focus

Appropriate

curriculum

a Community of stable

and competent teachers

Gospel values

PedagogyLove for students

A particular kind of school: a response beginning in 1680

teaching well prepared & adapted to pupil’s level…in their own language…in useful skills and knowledge

religious/spiritual formation

good order & social formation

correction (re-turning) from the

values of the street to the values of the

reign of god

student involvement and responsibility is

fostered

relationships are

paramount

teachers-students

students-students

teachers-teachers

The Reign of God is here but not yet

God acting here and nowI came…that they might have life and have it to

full. for this had to be the kind of ardent zeal you had for the salvation of those you instruct,

when you were led to sacrifice yourself and to spend your whole life to

give these children a Christian education and to procure for them the life of grace in this world and eternal life in the next. MTR 201.3

De La Salle’s thought on role of Lasallian schools

Unfavorable Economic

Conditions of Working

People and the Poor

Ignorance Lawlessness

The Christian School

De La Salle’s Thought continued…

The Christian SchoolFinancial Support

Competent Christian Educators

Social Formation

CivicResponsibility

SecularInstruction

ReligiousInstruction

VocationalIncompetence

ChristianSpirit

At the Serviceof the Churchand the State

The Double Contemplation

John Baptist de La Salle

A Double Contemplation

Is led from one

commitment to another

Children of artisans

God Who wants ALL saved

Who are far from

salvation

To MakeSalvation

AccessibleTo ALL

Making Salvation Accessible to ALL

God has had the goodness to remedy such an obstacle by the setting up of the Christian Schools

MTR 2.1

Christian Schools Teachers

Maintaining schools together and by

association