Pope Benedict on the Nature of University Reform

(01 Dec 08 - RV)Pope Benedict XVI reflected on the nature of University and the meaning of reform Monday when he met with a group of University students and professors from Parma in Northern Italy.

Pope Benedict began his discourse on a personal note, recalling the many years of his own life dedicated to research and teaching. He told the students that he continues to feel a close spiritual bond to University life and to follow its progress closely.

He then went on to speak of an Italian Saint, Hermit and Doctor of the Church Peter Damian, from whose life he said today’s university students and even professors can learn valuable lessons.Although living in the seclusion of the cloister, St Peter Damian was a forceful figure in the Gregorian Reform movement, whose personal example and many writings exercised great influence on religious life in the 11th and 12th centuries.
Our era, just as that of St Peter Damien, reflected Pope Benedict, is signed by uncertainties and a lack of unifying principals. Academic study he remarked, should serve to qualify the formative level of society, not just scientific research. It must offer young people the opportunity to mature intellectually, morally and civilly, by confronting themselves with those great questions that cry out the conscience of modern man.

Pope Benedict noted that the story of St Peter Damien, the great reformer of the Church, teaches us that every authentic reform must be first a spiritual and moral one that begins within the conscience. He observed that the subject of University reform is a current topic in Italy, reflecting that structural and technical changes can only be effective if they are accompanied by a series examination of conscience by University authorities, administrators, professors and students. Pope Benedict underlined that if we want a human environment to improve in quality and effectiveness, then we must begin by each one of us reforming ourselves, correcting that which could damage or obstruct the common good.

Pope Benedict reflected that just as St Peter Damien laboured for the reform of the Church so that the Church would enjoy greater spiritual and historical freedom, that University reform can only be valid if its ultimate goal is freedom; freedom of teaching, freedom of research, freedom of the academic institution from political and economic powers. This underlined Pope Benedict does not mean that the University become self-referential, or exploit public resources, it means freedom in the Christian sense, freedom of the University to culturally and scientifically form people for the development of a civil society.
 In conclusion Pope Benedict, said today’s younger generations are exposed to a double risk, largely due to the widespread use of new technologies: on one hand, noted Pope Benedict there is a danger that the students capacity for concentration and mental application on a personal level are reduced; on the other hand there is a danger that the students isolate themselves in an increasingly virtual reality.
University, by its very nature, observed the Pope embodies that virtuous equilibrium between the individual and the community, between research and reflection, always open to the universal horizon.