INTRODICTION
Educational institutions play a crucial role in building and enhancing the immunity and resilience of every society in confronting external and internal voices and forces which oppose pluralism and advocate for exclusion and violence.
Education has a profound effect on individual development and can promote or prevent prejudice and conversely promote or prevent tolerance.
Lessons learned in the classroom stay with us as we continue to grow, and our learning does not stop once we have left the classroom.
Pedagogy is about sound relationship with the world, dialogue verses education, formation of dialogue what we can call today upgrading, a line of thought that is creative, exploiting other interdisciplinary theories.
A. Bongiovanni point of departure is from (EG 250) more so in the exchange of experiences and authentic active listening to the others.
We are engaging into theological formation to know what to say out there, relational experience with others.
Dialogue is part of the church and its indispensable. Changing the system thinking what we today call upgrading so that all the life of people who enter the language of gospel, theological renewal and way of looking at the mission, with theological paradigm shift. Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is about creating a new world to be lived in, through social transformation of the people.
This leads to aspiration for peace and development. For dialogue has to be carried out with respect and trust, its about cultivating a genuine friendship, listening well of what is being said and above all fostering love that casts out fear. J. Locke on his theory of Knowledge states:
“Since its unavoidable to the greatest part of men, if not all, to have several opinions, without certain and indubitable proofs of their truth, and it carries too great an imputation of ignorance, lightness, or folly, for men to quit and renounce their former tenets presently upon the offer of an argument which they cannot immediately answer and show the insufficiency of; it would, methinks, become all men to maintain peace and the common offices of humanity and friendship in the diversity of opinions, since we cannot reasonably expect that any one should readily and obsequiously quit his own opinion, and embrace ours with blind resignation to an authority which the understanding of man acknowledge not. For, however it may often mistakes, it can own no other guide but reason, nor blindly submit to the will and dictates of another […] We should do well to commensurate our mutual ignorance, and endeavour to remove it in all the gentle and fair ways of information, and not instantly treat others ill as obstinate and perverse because they will not renounce their own and receive our opinions, or at least those we would force upon them, when its more than probable that we are no less obstinate in not embracing some of theirs […] There is reason to think, that if men were better instructed themselves, they would be less imposing on others…We cannot know the existence of the other people, or of the physical world, for these, if they exist, are not merely ideas in my mind. Each one of us, accordingly, must so far as knowledge is concerned, be shut up in himself, and cut off from all contact with the outer world.” (Contemplation)
1.0 RESEARCH APPROACH
In this research we are going to address ourselves to the field of pedagogy as a scientific discipline of understanding interreligious dialogue.
Much of the reflections and approach will be based on the course work and new paradigm shifts created during the sessions, book launching with reference to that of professor A. Bongiovanni perspective towards the culture of dialogue, the significant role of education, with reference to Towards the Culture of Dialogue, the Significant Role of Education, in Mission Makes the Church.
This is being grounded educationally on the reality that is not only found in the academia but through connectography.
1.1 PEDAGOGY OF INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE
Educators promote cultural and religious diversity with pedagogical features, that compromise of content of learning; structural interaction and facilitative leadership.
This has its basis on how we communicate these processes of dialogical transmission, critical analysis of reality and psychological processes that is open with identical engagement that transcends the differences where all work together to achieve the desired outcomes of intergroup understanding where relationships are built on collaboration.
This gives us a clear picture where pedagogy of interreligious is grounded on church teachings for example GS #82 states:
But we should not let false hope deceive us. For unless enmities and hatred are put away and firm, honest agreements concerning world peace are reached in the future, humanity, which already is in the middle of a grave crisis, even though it is endowed with remarkable knowledge, will perhaps be brought to that dismal hour in which it will experience no peace other than the dreadful peace of death. But, while we say this, the Church of Christ, present in the midst of the anxiety of this age, does not cease to hope most firmly. She intends to propose to our age over and over again, in season and out of season, this apostolic message: "Behold, now is the acceptable time for a change of heart; behold! now is the day of salvation."
H. Kung clearly build this in a concrete way when he says:
“No world peace without peace among religions, no peace among religions without dialogue between religious and dialogue between religions with accurate knowledge of one another” .
Today, religion has become a dividing factor in most communities, schools and use of religious symbols.
Missionary agents engaged in pedagogy of interreligious dialogue of formation have to be formed with deep interreligious understandings of future challenges.
This means understanding well the difficulties handled in the first place. Pedagogy of educational promotes awareness and understanding of these issues and obligations for interreligious practitioners to be sensitive in their approach and method of approach when dealing with other religions.
The mind may sometimes hold us back, but quite often it travels ahead of us, where the heart has not yet reached, where words are still worrying themselves in existence.
This has to transform theological consciousness and practice that is proper where believers adhere to the truth of faith positions expressed theologically, claims tested and purified though interreligious and dialogical practices.
Today, humanity is endangered and confronted with great challenges that come with radical changes with few answers to the many questions confronting modern man and woman such as terrorism, religious intolerance, religious hatred, emigrational phenomena, nuclear threats and uncertainties of tomorrow.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue creates big tank thinking in forming educators to become great prophetic witnesses in their professions in approaching modern challenges that are affecting the globe.
Modern technological challenges deserve right responses that are sound and scientifically grounded, as Michel de Montaigne would state “e meglio una testa ben fatta che una testa piena”.
For its better to learn the system of thinking that is sound. Morin insists that it is a complicated realty with global consequences that calls for a sober mind in handling issues where educational pedagogy becomes the solution to the challenges.
This can be done through solidarity, freely and just gestures founded on dialogue of life that calls for a paradigm shift in anthropological attitude of approach towards challenges of interreligious dialogue.
This calls for creativity and mind openness without any prejudice and fear. Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is a scientific research and educational system thinking that opens the mind to discussions, conversions, changes of attitudes, free spaces in in mutual learning, dialogue of heart and soul, one is either contaminated or fertilized in this process of pedagogy of interreligious dialogue.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is a missiological response and approach towards current issues facing man and woman today.
We have to understand the other’s point of view, be good listeners, studying together our religious experiences and coming to terms with our fears and shadows.
We have to walk the talk once we get involved in pedagogical interreligious dialogue. We relearn the new language communication that is acceptable. In very dialogue there is bound to be confrontations are bound to happen.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is not about controlling others way of thinking but encountering others. This in itself is a new shift of thought.
Formation is about living in the context. seminary, college, university, public institutions. Things must be done well and in a professional way.
In our pedagogical search for interdisciplinary processes is about sharing our religious experiences within interreligious dialogue.
Daily we are bound to confront issues of intolerance, religious hatred, discriminations of all types, oppression and inequality, that needs professional handling and approach on how to be authentic prophetic witnessing. We are living in a boiling pot of religious when any miscalculation can spark off a conflict and war in the name of God.
1.2. PEDAGOGICAL FORMATION AND APPROACH
Pedagogy is a Greek word that has an origin in the form of slave assignments to take care of the master’s children more so accompanying them to school as a guide.
This gives us a picture of what pedagogy entails. An education without pedagogy is an ideology without direction.
The reality of pedagogy of religious dialogue means that we have to be pedagogically sound, relevant and effective in all that we do.
The church has been preoccupied with education of her children, more so in her approach on missioning and evangelization.
A university is a place for preparation and passing out professionals: clergymen, the religious, lawyers, medical doctors, scientist, politicians, business leaders, teachers and many other paraprofessionals.
Quality education on all levels becomes a necessity for any person or nation that doesn’t want to live on the fringes of social and economic progress.
Education by its very nature is a great value for humans, cherished throughout human history. As St. Augustine could state “Our words speak but our examples cry out.”
Beyond knowledge, education should lead to wisdom which is the foundation of all human good and happiness.
As a missionary agent this is what pedagogical formation is all about, learning more about oneself and the other, without the purpose of desire to uncover the truth or determine who is right and who is wrong about the spiritual realm.
This can be increased through education that can create peacefulness in individuals, communities and societies. This fosters changes that makes the world a better place to live and co-exist, eliminating prejudice, encouraging tolerance, at the forefront defence of human rights, protectors of the environment against destruction and contamination.
Today many educational peace programmes around the world are directly address religious conflicts, discrimination and oppression as an issue needing resolutions for a peaceful society for all to call home.
Cultural violence is common and rampant due to little emphasis on how handle issues in the family set up, community and the entire society.
These issues sometimes get to boiling point or out of hand hence, rendering peace makers in the conflict irrelevant.
Dialogue is meant to finding truth, interior transparency. A critical observation of other people’s opinion can be articulated in the pedagogical and educative approach leading to educative and pedagogical dialects.
Dialogue like research is at the heart of truth, for to know the self and the culture of origin can’t make you a slave of history.
Pedagogy of interreligious is about being educated on how to critique, creativity and above all innovative skills at play.
Daily we are dialoguing with ourselves or with the other. The challenge is not to fall in excesses by doing things in the literal manner of the term but professionally.
Pedagogical-educative didactics has to put the learner in crisis so as to provoke answers in the student to start thinking about certain things proper perspective with the reality before his/her eyes.
In this context a paradigm shift in pedagogical understanding of interreligious dialogue which creates a blue print for the society and environment to adopt as far as religious conflict and resolutions are concerned.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue has to be a school of love and dialogue, where one enters into dialectical approaches of dialogue, in form and spirit with an ending interrogation of what is before one’s reality.
It’s all about connectographical attitude with what one perceives to be God, the ultimate Truth in the sense of our humanness. One can’t close himself or herself in that soliloquy, lest one becomes an island, which even that is impossible, its about openness to enter a new reality, a new life, a new thought and a new horizon.
We become true humanity, new life syntonised to a frequency when we do active listening.
This is a thought Martin Buber (1879-1915) builds on I-Thou with the very wide open-ended world to rediscover not as a tool or instrument but that which presents and talks to the thou in relational angle component.
As a man encounters another man, something certainly is lost and gained at the same time in the process, creating a new reality and that is what relationship is all about, different spirits that are enriched and glorified.(fertilization)
1.4 THE CULTURE OF DIALOGUE
The question at hand is how can we connect cultural diversity with educative itineraries that lead to equity? P. Freire could pose, more so in recognizing the difference if one refuses to recognize the other as a partner.
For him identity presupposes a relationship of equality and the difference, which could be antagonistic or not.
There is only dialogue and partnership when the difference is not antagonistic. For dialogue is a relationship of unity of nonantagonistic contrary factors, between antagonistic factors there is merely conflict.
But a true pedagogy is built on an itinerary which ranges from popular culture to literature erudite culture, passing through the training of the critical consciousness, transforming the structure of teaching and extension of education to everyone.
The culture of dialogue has a foundation in education. It’s the task for all Christians and it can’t be left only to the good intentions and fortunate insights of some precursors and so-called experts.
Ambrogio emphasises that many obstacles, prejudices and many other forms of resistance that have been forced down to people simply impoverish and renders the situation worse.
This has to reinvent itself into a work in progress only in the culture of dialogue.
This calls for all to learn to accept others and their different ways of living, thinking and speaking, as clearly stipulated in the Apostolic Exhortation EG #250
An attitude of openness in truth and in love must characterize the dialogue with the followers of non-Christian religions, in spite of various obstacles and difficulties, especially forms of fundamentalism on both sides. Interreligious dialogue is a necessary condition for peace in the world, and so it is a duty for Christians as well as other religious communities. This dialogue is in first place a conversation about human existence or simply, as the bishops of India have put it, a matter of “being open to them, sharing their joys and sorrows”.[194] In this way we learn to accept others and their different ways of living, thinking and speaking. We can then join one another in taking up the duty of serving justice and peace, which should become a basic principle of all our exchanges.
A dialogue which seeks social peace and justice is in itself, beyond all merely practical considerations, an ethical commitment which brings about a new social situation.
Efforts made in dealing with a specific theme can become a process in which, by mutual listening, both parts can be purified and enriched. These efforts, therefore, can also express love for truth.
We ought to join each other in the duty of serving justice and peace, basic principles of dialogue of life.
This has to lead us to a systematic formation, rethinking theological formation in view of the church’s missionary transformation and the church has to go forth and in clear terms and conditions.
This is not about Transmitting knowledge about the other religions, overcoming prejudice and favouring understanding that is sound.
This will call for religious and the clergy to put much emphasis and importance of dialogue more so that of pedagogy of interreligious dialogue to become a core course in formation houses and major seminary curriculum.
The educational system should incorporate intercultural formation in the students to open their world view of the current realties of what is happening around them.
The education should be open to engage and reconstruction of definition of crisis and above all a starting point of starting to get involved in dialogue of life.
This should lead to fertilization to learn to see what we did not see before, adequate preparation for listening and openness, together with certain theological and cultural preparation that will allow awareness of cultural and religious differences to grow and prepare the terrain on which the dialogue will be built. Formative process goes beyond a mere encounter between cultures.
Theology should be very grounded in such a way that the issues of interreligious dialogue have to take centre stage in their formation processes. This can be discovered in the post-synodal document Ecclesia in Asia when Ambrogio cites #31
Only those with a mature and convinced Christian faith are qualified in genuine interreligious dialogue.
Only Christians who are deeply immersed in the mystery of Christ and who are happy in their faith community can without undue risk and with hope of positive fruit engage in interreligious dialogue.
Ambrogio places his emphasis on theological formation in its contextualization of the truths of faith and hermeneutic of the contexts from which the “the signs of transcendence” and ontological need for salvation” can emerge .
CONCLUSION
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is a serious investment that has to be jealously guided, and this can only be done only once the church start subjecting herself, to quality assessment and evaluation tools.
The students and mission agents should have a system thinking that is sound and value based and culturally open ended.
All those getting involved in mission mandate and vision sight should be people who can think globally but act locally.
The pedagogy is interreligious dialogue doesn’t claim to know everything but is open to new insights and discoveries, living some space for the holy Spirit.
Once the interrelationship is well polished out, there should be also some space of the Holy Spirit, just in case the what if situation arises. This calls for serious theological formation that is very relevant, effective and efficient.
The people can know whether a missionary is very academic, down to earth or a holy man of God.
As in the gospel of John he concludes his sequela of stain the “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another (Jn 13:35.)”
On the basis of the Second Vatican Council’s teaching, formation will have to aim at forming persons who are ready to be honest and critical of their own past and others.
Hans Kung says, ‘There is no peace in the world without peace among religions, and there is no dialogue among the religions without accurate reciprocal knowledge.’
A person involved in dialogue should not imagine himself in another’s place or put himself in another’s shoes, but rather look for elements, symbolic forms through which, in each context, the person understand themselves.
Ambrogio critically delves into this issue by emphasizing that It’s important to understand how others describe their own tradition rather than just reading a description from texts or hearing it from professors within the Christian tradition, for formation should take place even when and where one enters into new horizons and above all the encounter which reveals new aspects of reality
A revolutionary pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is not a challenge of unveiling reality by coming to know it critically, teasing out facts, but in the task of serious system thinking and recreating that knowledge anew (aggiornamento), where all come together and reflect of the life experiences to forge the way forward with concrete working progress, nobody should feel side-lined, for it’s a common effort solidified.
It is not one religion, pastor, bishop, cardinal, teacher, principle, president show but a serious committed involvement.
As missionary agents and prophetic witnesses in the globalised world, we come to appreciate the other when we are able to invent and re-invent, sometimes it will be tiresome and tedious, we may run out of steam and morale to continue but we need to reconcile everything back to Christ, Him being Christ the teacher in this pedagogy of interreligious dialogue of life, open to respect of the daily questions about life and death but also respecting the actions of the Holy Spirit in each one of us, relational synergy of I-Thou connectographical nexus.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BONGIOVANNI, A., Towards the Culture of Dialogue, the Significant Role of Education, in Mission Makes the Church, 1916-October 31-2016, Pontifical Missionary Union, (ed) Fabrizio Meroni, Aracne editrice Rome 2017, 163-194.
FLORES, G, D’Arcais., in Nuovo Dizionario di Pedagogia, a cura di Giuseppe Flores d’Arcais edizioni Paoline, Roma 1982, pp. 326-335.
GADOTTI, M., Pedagogy of Praxis, A Dialectical Philosophy of Education, (Trans. J.Milton) State University of New York Press, 1996.
HARRIS I.M. (2004).“Peace education theory. Journal of Peace Education”, 1(1),5–20., 29/05/2018
RUSSEL.B., A History of Western Philosophy, And Its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present-day, Simon and Schuster, Inc, Rockefeller Centre New York, 1945
KUNG, H., Christianity and the World Religions: Paths of Dialogue with Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, Fount Paperbacks, London 1987.
MANCHINI, D., Class notes on Globalization and Ethics in the Era of Complexity, LUMSA (DEF) aggiornamento 12 febbraio Roma 2018.
SORENSEN, N - K.E. MAXWELL., “Taking a hand on” Approach to Diversity in Higher Education: A Critical Dialogical Model for Effective Intergroup Interaction, in Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, 9(1),2009 3-35
Educational institutions play a crucial role in building and enhancing the immunity and resilience of every society in confronting external and internal voices and forces which oppose pluralism and advocate for exclusion and violence.
Education has a profound effect on individual development and can promote or prevent prejudice and conversely promote or prevent tolerance.
Lessons learned in the classroom stay with us as we continue to grow, and our learning does not stop once we have left the classroom.
Pedagogy is about sound relationship with the world, dialogue verses education, formation of dialogue what we can call today upgrading, a line of thought that is creative, exploiting other interdisciplinary theories.
A. Bongiovanni point of departure is from (EG 250) more so in the exchange of experiences and authentic active listening to the others.
We are engaging into theological formation to know what to say out there, relational experience with others.
Dialogue is part of the church and its indispensable. Changing the system thinking what we today call upgrading so that all the life of people who enter the language of gospel, theological renewal and way of looking at the mission, with theological paradigm shift. Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is about creating a new world to be lived in, through social transformation of the people.
This leads to aspiration for peace and development. For dialogue has to be carried out with respect and trust, its about cultivating a genuine friendship, listening well of what is being said and above all fostering love that casts out fear. J. Locke on his theory of Knowledge states:
“Since its unavoidable to the greatest part of men, if not all, to have several opinions, without certain and indubitable proofs of their truth, and it carries too great an imputation of ignorance, lightness, or folly, for men to quit and renounce their former tenets presently upon the offer of an argument which they cannot immediately answer and show the insufficiency of; it would, methinks, become all men to maintain peace and the common offices of humanity and friendship in the diversity of opinions, since we cannot reasonably expect that any one should readily and obsequiously quit his own opinion, and embrace ours with blind resignation to an authority which the understanding of man acknowledge not. For, however it may often mistakes, it can own no other guide but reason, nor blindly submit to the will and dictates of another […] We should do well to commensurate our mutual ignorance, and endeavour to remove it in all the gentle and fair ways of information, and not instantly treat others ill as obstinate and perverse because they will not renounce their own and receive our opinions, or at least those we would force upon them, when its more than probable that we are no less obstinate in not embracing some of theirs […] There is reason to think, that if men were better instructed themselves, they would be less imposing on others…We cannot know the existence of the other people, or of the physical world, for these, if they exist, are not merely ideas in my mind. Each one of us, accordingly, must so far as knowledge is concerned, be shut up in himself, and cut off from all contact with the outer world.” (Contemplation)
1.0 RESEARCH APPROACH
In this research we are going to address ourselves to the field of pedagogy as a scientific discipline of understanding interreligious dialogue.
Much of the reflections and approach will be based on the course work and new paradigm shifts created during the sessions, book launching with reference to that of professor A. Bongiovanni perspective towards the culture of dialogue, the significant role of education, with reference to Towards the Culture of Dialogue, the Significant Role of Education, in Mission Makes the Church.
This is being grounded educationally on the reality that is not only found in the academia but through connectography.
1.1 PEDAGOGY OF INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE
Educators promote cultural and religious diversity with pedagogical features, that compromise of content of learning; structural interaction and facilitative leadership.
This has its basis on how we communicate these processes of dialogical transmission, critical analysis of reality and psychological processes that is open with identical engagement that transcends the differences where all work together to achieve the desired outcomes of intergroup understanding where relationships are built on collaboration.
This gives us a clear picture where pedagogy of interreligious is grounded on church teachings for example GS #82 states:
But we should not let false hope deceive us. For unless enmities and hatred are put away and firm, honest agreements concerning world peace are reached in the future, humanity, which already is in the middle of a grave crisis, even though it is endowed with remarkable knowledge, will perhaps be brought to that dismal hour in which it will experience no peace other than the dreadful peace of death. But, while we say this, the Church of Christ, present in the midst of the anxiety of this age, does not cease to hope most firmly. She intends to propose to our age over and over again, in season and out of season, this apostolic message: "Behold, now is the acceptable time for a change of heart; behold! now is the day of salvation."
H. Kung clearly build this in a concrete way when he says:
“No world peace without peace among religions, no peace among religions without dialogue between religious and dialogue between religions with accurate knowledge of one another” .
Today, religion has become a dividing factor in most communities, schools and use of religious symbols.
Missionary agents engaged in pedagogy of interreligious dialogue of formation have to be formed with deep interreligious understandings of future challenges.
This means understanding well the difficulties handled in the first place. Pedagogy of educational promotes awareness and understanding of these issues and obligations for interreligious practitioners to be sensitive in their approach and method of approach when dealing with other religions.
The mind may sometimes hold us back, but quite often it travels ahead of us, where the heart has not yet reached, where words are still worrying themselves in existence.
This has to transform theological consciousness and practice that is proper where believers adhere to the truth of faith positions expressed theologically, claims tested and purified though interreligious and dialogical practices.
Today, humanity is endangered and confronted with great challenges that come with radical changes with few answers to the many questions confronting modern man and woman such as terrorism, religious intolerance, religious hatred, emigrational phenomena, nuclear threats and uncertainties of tomorrow.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue creates big tank thinking in forming educators to become great prophetic witnesses in their professions in approaching modern challenges that are affecting the globe.
Modern technological challenges deserve right responses that are sound and scientifically grounded, as Michel de Montaigne would state “e meglio una testa ben fatta che una testa piena”.
For its better to learn the system of thinking that is sound. Morin insists that it is a complicated realty with global consequences that calls for a sober mind in handling issues where educational pedagogy becomes the solution to the challenges.
This can be done through solidarity, freely and just gestures founded on dialogue of life that calls for a paradigm shift in anthropological attitude of approach towards challenges of interreligious dialogue.
This calls for creativity and mind openness without any prejudice and fear. Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is a scientific research and educational system thinking that opens the mind to discussions, conversions, changes of attitudes, free spaces in in mutual learning, dialogue of heart and soul, one is either contaminated or fertilized in this process of pedagogy of interreligious dialogue.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is a missiological response and approach towards current issues facing man and woman today.
We have to understand the other’s point of view, be good listeners, studying together our religious experiences and coming to terms with our fears and shadows.
We have to walk the talk once we get involved in pedagogical interreligious dialogue. We relearn the new language communication that is acceptable. In very dialogue there is bound to be confrontations are bound to happen.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is not about controlling others way of thinking but encountering others. This in itself is a new shift of thought.
Formation is about living in the context. seminary, college, university, public institutions. Things must be done well and in a professional way.
In our pedagogical search for interdisciplinary processes is about sharing our religious experiences within interreligious dialogue.
Daily we are bound to confront issues of intolerance, religious hatred, discriminations of all types, oppression and inequality, that needs professional handling and approach on how to be authentic prophetic witnessing. We are living in a boiling pot of religious when any miscalculation can spark off a conflict and war in the name of God.
1.2. PEDAGOGICAL FORMATION AND APPROACH
Pedagogy is a Greek word that has an origin in the form of slave assignments to take care of the master’s children more so accompanying them to school as a guide.
This gives us a picture of what pedagogy entails. An education without pedagogy is an ideology without direction.
The reality of pedagogy of religious dialogue means that we have to be pedagogically sound, relevant and effective in all that we do.
The church has been preoccupied with education of her children, more so in her approach on missioning and evangelization.
A university is a place for preparation and passing out professionals: clergymen, the religious, lawyers, medical doctors, scientist, politicians, business leaders, teachers and many other paraprofessionals.
Quality education on all levels becomes a necessity for any person or nation that doesn’t want to live on the fringes of social and economic progress.
Education by its very nature is a great value for humans, cherished throughout human history. As St. Augustine could state “Our words speak but our examples cry out.”
Beyond knowledge, education should lead to wisdom which is the foundation of all human good and happiness.
As a missionary agent this is what pedagogical formation is all about, learning more about oneself and the other, without the purpose of desire to uncover the truth or determine who is right and who is wrong about the spiritual realm.
This can be increased through education that can create peacefulness in individuals, communities and societies. This fosters changes that makes the world a better place to live and co-exist, eliminating prejudice, encouraging tolerance, at the forefront defence of human rights, protectors of the environment against destruction and contamination.
Today many educational peace programmes around the world are directly address religious conflicts, discrimination and oppression as an issue needing resolutions for a peaceful society for all to call home.
Cultural violence is common and rampant due to little emphasis on how handle issues in the family set up, community and the entire society.
These issues sometimes get to boiling point or out of hand hence, rendering peace makers in the conflict irrelevant.
Dialogue is meant to finding truth, interior transparency. A critical observation of other people’s opinion can be articulated in the pedagogical and educative approach leading to educative and pedagogical dialects.
Dialogue like research is at the heart of truth, for to know the self and the culture of origin can’t make you a slave of history.
Pedagogy of interreligious is about being educated on how to critique, creativity and above all innovative skills at play.
Daily we are dialoguing with ourselves or with the other. The challenge is not to fall in excesses by doing things in the literal manner of the term but professionally.
Pedagogical-educative didactics has to put the learner in crisis so as to provoke answers in the student to start thinking about certain things proper perspective with the reality before his/her eyes.
In this context a paradigm shift in pedagogical understanding of interreligious dialogue which creates a blue print for the society and environment to adopt as far as religious conflict and resolutions are concerned.
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue has to be a school of love and dialogue, where one enters into dialectical approaches of dialogue, in form and spirit with an ending interrogation of what is before one’s reality.
It’s all about connectographical attitude with what one perceives to be God, the ultimate Truth in the sense of our humanness. One can’t close himself or herself in that soliloquy, lest one becomes an island, which even that is impossible, its about openness to enter a new reality, a new life, a new thought and a new horizon.
We become true humanity, new life syntonised to a frequency when we do active listening.
This is a thought Martin Buber (1879-1915) builds on I-Thou with the very wide open-ended world to rediscover not as a tool or instrument but that which presents and talks to the thou in relational angle component.
As a man encounters another man, something certainly is lost and gained at the same time in the process, creating a new reality and that is what relationship is all about, different spirits that are enriched and glorified.(fertilization)
1.4 THE CULTURE OF DIALOGUE
The question at hand is how can we connect cultural diversity with educative itineraries that lead to equity? P. Freire could pose, more so in recognizing the difference if one refuses to recognize the other as a partner.
For him identity presupposes a relationship of equality and the difference, which could be antagonistic or not.
There is only dialogue and partnership when the difference is not antagonistic. For dialogue is a relationship of unity of nonantagonistic contrary factors, between antagonistic factors there is merely conflict.
But a true pedagogy is built on an itinerary which ranges from popular culture to literature erudite culture, passing through the training of the critical consciousness, transforming the structure of teaching and extension of education to everyone.
The culture of dialogue has a foundation in education. It’s the task for all Christians and it can’t be left only to the good intentions and fortunate insights of some precursors and so-called experts.
Ambrogio emphasises that many obstacles, prejudices and many other forms of resistance that have been forced down to people simply impoverish and renders the situation worse.
This has to reinvent itself into a work in progress only in the culture of dialogue.
This calls for all to learn to accept others and their different ways of living, thinking and speaking, as clearly stipulated in the Apostolic Exhortation EG #250
An attitude of openness in truth and in love must characterize the dialogue with the followers of non-Christian religions, in spite of various obstacles and difficulties, especially forms of fundamentalism on both sides. Interreligious dialogue is a necessary condition for peace in the world, and so it is a duty for Christians as well as other religious communities. This dialogue is in first place a conversation about human existence or simply, as the bishops of India have put it, a matter of “being open to them, sharing their joys and sorrows”.[194] In this way we learn to accept others and their different ways of living, thinking and speaking. We can then join one another in taking up the duty of serving justice and peace, which should become a basic principle of all our exchanges.
A dialogue which seeks social peace and justice is in itself, beyond all merely practical considerations, an ethical commitment which brings about a new social situation.
Efforts made in dealing with a specific theme can become a process in which, by mutual listening, both parts can be purified and enriched. These efforts, therefore, can also express love for truth.
We ought to join each other in the duty of serving justice and peace, basic principles of dialogue of life.
This has to lead us to a systematic formation, rethinking theological formation in view of the church’s missionary transformation and the church has to go forth and in clear terms and conditions.
This is not about Transmitting knowledge about the other religions, overcoming prejudice and favouring understanding that is sound.
This will call for religious and the clergy to put much emphasis and importance of dialogue more so that of pedagogy of interreligious dialogue to become a core course in formation houses and major seminary curriculum.
The educational system should incorporate intercultural formation in the students to open their world view of the current realties of what is happening around them.
The education should be open to engage and reconstruction of definition of crisis and above all a starting point of starting to get involved in dialogue of life.
This should lead to fertilization to learn to see what we did not see before, adequate preparation for listening and openness, together with certain theological and cultural preparation that will allow awareness of cultural and religious differences to grow and prepare the terrain on which the dialogue will be built. Formative process goes beyond a mere encounter between cultures.
Theology should be very grounded in such a way that the issues of interreligious dialogue have to take centre stage in their formation processes. This can be discovered in the post-synodal document Ecclesia in Asia when Ambrogio cites #31
Only those with a mature and convinced Christian faith are qualified in genuine interreligious dialogue.
Only Christians who are deeply immersed in the mystery of Christ and who are happy in their faith community can without undue risk and with hope of positive fruit engage in interreligious dialogue.
Ambrogio places his emphasis on theological formation in its contextualization of the truths of faith and hermeneutic of the contexts from which the “the signs of transcendence” and ontological need for salvation” can emerge .
CONCLUSION
Pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is a serious investment that has to be jealously guided, and this can only be done only once the church start subjecting herself, to quality assessment and evaluation tools.
The students and mission agents should have a system thinking that is sound and value based and culturally open ended.
All those getting involved in mission mandate and vision sight should be people who can think globally but act locally.
The pedagogy is interreligious dialogue doesn’t claim to know everything but is open to new insights and discoveries, living some space for the holy Spirit.
Once the interrelationship is well polished out, there should be also some space of the Holy Spirit, just in case the what if situation arises. This calls for serious theological formation that is very relevant, effective and efficient.
The people can know whether a missionary is very academic, down to earth or a holy man of God.
As in the gospel of John he concludes his sequela of stain the “By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another (Jn 13:35.)”
On the basis of the Second Vatican Council’s teaching, formation will have to aim at forming persons who are ready to be honest and critical of their own past and others.
Hans Kung says, ‘There is no peace in the world without peace among religions, and there is no dialogue among the religions without accurate reciprocal knowledge.’
A person involved in dialogue should not imagine himself in another’s place or put himself in another’s shoes, but rather look for elements, symbolic forms through which, in each context, the person understand themselves.
Ambrogio critically delves into this issue by emphasizing that It’s important to understand how others describe their own tradition rather than just reading a description from texts or hearing it from professors within the Christian tradition, for formation should take place even when and where one enters into new horizons and above all the encounter which reveals new aspects of reality
A revolutionary pedagogy of interreligious dialogue is not a challenge of unveiling reality by coming to know it critically, teasing out facts, but in the task of serious system thinking and recreating that knowledge anew (aggiornamento), where all come together and reflect of the life experiences to forge the way forward with concrete working progress, nobody should feel side-lined, for it’s a common effort solidified.
It is not one religion, pastor, bishop, cardinal, teacher, principle, president show but a serious committed involvement.
As missionary agents and prophetic witnesses in the globalised world, we come to appreciate the other when we are able to invent and re-invent, sometimes it will be tiresome and tedious, we may run out of steam and morale to continue but we need to reconcile everything back to Christ, Him being Christ the teacher in this pedagogy of interreligious dialogue of life, open to respect of the daily questions about life and death but also respecting the actions of the Holy Spirit in each one of us, relational synergy of I-Thou connectographical nexus.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BONGIOVANNI, A., Towards the Culture of Dialogue, the Significant Role of Education, in Mission Makes the Church, 1916-October 31-2016, Pontifical Missionary Union, (ed) Fabrizio Meroni, Aracne editrice Rome 2017, 163-194.
FLORES, G, D’Arcais., in Nuovo Dizionario di Pedagogia, a cura di Giuseppe Flores d’Arcais edizioni Paoline, Roma 1982, pp. 326-335.
GADOTTI, M., Pedagogy of Praxis, A Dialectical Philosophy of Education, (Trans. J.Milton) State University of New York Press, 1996.
HARRIS I.M. (2004).“Peace education theory. Journal of Peace Education”, 1(1),5–20.
RUSSEL.B., A History of Western Philosophy, And Its Connection with Political and Social Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present-day, Simon and Schuster, Inc, Rockefeller Centre New York, 1945
KUNG, H., Christianity and the World Religions: Paths of Dialogue with Islam, Hinduism and Buddhism, Fount Paperbacks, London 1987.
MANCHINI, D., Class notes on Globalization and Ethics in the Era of Complexity, LUMSA (DEF) aggiornamento 12 febbraio Roma 2018.
SORENSEN, N - K.E. MAXWELL., “Taking a hand on” Approach to Diversity in Higher Education: A Critical Dialogical Model for Effective Intergroup Interaction, in Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy, 9(1),2009 3-35
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