The role of spiritual formation in the education of modern human beings: A European Christian perspective

One of the most considerable changes in the contemporary European educational mentality is a person’s disconnection from spiritual life. Christian formation has been replaced with religious pluralism, in terms of syncretism influenced by global economic ideologies. Some consequences are low resilience and low spiritual resistance to contemporary challenges, associated with mental traumas or social behaviour deficits. Is it possible to restore the modern person’s spiritual education? There is no evolution in the modern individual’s social life without a horizon of spiritual expectation and fulfilment, different from the strictly material one. Moreover, conscious education cannot deprive people of cultivating the spiritual part of their consciousness from which the real values of existence are born. A series of arguments for renewing the relation between school and the mature, Scripture-based Christian thinking in the spirit of the European pedagogy are revealed by the factual historical analyses. Both Eastern and Western European experiences have met after 13 years of evolving into two antagonist geopolitical spheres. Their lessons in the education field could be an appropriate model, academically applied at the cultural mentality and the European pedagogy level.Contribution: With this study, I want to highlight the historical and conceptual frameworks of the Christian religious education meaning in the context of the rediscovery of Orthodox Christianity by the international theological culture in post-communism. Orthodox Christianity, forgotten in dictionaries and syntheses by the Western theological elite, brings in a spiritualisation of education according to the Lord Jesus Christ’s Gospel and not of the ideological cultural interests.

Ecumenical and Traditioned Measurement: Measuring Christian Maturation Across Distinct Traditions of Christian Spirituality

The aim of this article is to explore some of the challenges of measuring Christian spiritual development across distinct traditions of Christian spirituality. This presses into questions of what might be universal and what might be particular when it comes to Christian spirituality in how it is understood and practiced. We address the feasibility of a general, ecumenical measure by hearing from representative voices of five traditions of Christian spirituality: African American spirituality, Anglican spirituality, Benedictine spirituality, Pentecostal spirituality, and Reformed spirituality. After noting some of the distinctives of these traditions, we conclude with four strategies for navigating the unity and diversity of Christian spirituality in conceptualizing and measuring Christian formation.

Constructivist Curriculum for Christian Transformation

This article seeks to present a faith-based constructive approach to curriculum design for Christian formation. It explores the essential components of a curriculum that encourages the transference of knowledge and understanding to promote Christ-like transformation. Based on this information, an inquiry-based curriculum design method based on the Inquiry Design Model (IDM) is developed that balances biblically cohesive constructive principles with the established vision for Christian education.

Mystagogic Dimension of Christian Formation in the Family Community

Mistagogiczny wymiar formacji chrześcijańskiej we wspólnocie rodzinnej Przeżywana w 2020 roku ogólnoświatowa pandemia koronawirusa spowodowała wprowadzenie surowych ograniczeń regulujących wszystkie przestrzenie życia społecznego. Dotyczyły one także możliwości uczestnictwa wiernych w liturgii oraz w codziennym życiu wspólnoty Kościoła. Skutkiem tego, wielu wiernych przeżywało liturgiczne obchody Wielkiejnocy oraz kolejnych niedziel paschalnych we wspólnocie najbliższej rodziny. Zgodnie ze wskazaniami biskupów, także we wspólnocie rodzinnej miało miejsce bezpośrednie przygotowanie dzieci do przyjęcia sakramentu pokuty i pojednania oraz I Komunii św. Rodziny stanęły zatem wobec konieczności wypełnienia zadań właściwych dla katechumenatu. Wobec powyższego, można postawić pytanie, czy w taki właśnie sposób – jako wspólnotę „domowego Kościoła” – postrzegają siebie współczesne chrześcijańskie rodziny? Czy są świadome swojej misji i odpowiednio do jej podjęcia przegotowane? Celem artykułu jest wydobycie mistagogicznego wymiaru formacji chrześcijańskiej we wspólnocie rodzinnej. Autor podejmuje refleksję nad rodziną jako miejscem urzeczywistnia się misterium Kościoła. Omawia także cele i zadania katechumenatu rodzinnego, podejmowane z racji udziału rodziny w życiu i misji Kościoła.

Theology as social activity: theological action research and teaching the knowledge of Christian ethics and practical ministry

Theological Action Research (TAR) is a way of doing and teaching theology and forming students that surmounts the problems associated with both formal theologies and theological ethnographies. Drawing from models of action research developed in other fields, this paper outlines an approach to teaching practical ministry grounded in a collaborative mode of inquiry capable of generating new insights into humanity's relation to God while also engendering the ethical-political powers that give shape to collective life. As a process of what anthropologist Lia Haro calls eth-o-graphy, Christian formation and knowledge production cannot be disconnected from cooperative participation in communities of practice dedicated to this kind of social, ecclesial activity. The paper goes on to describe how the author has begun to implement this TAR model at a Catholic, Jesuit institution, offering some promising preliminary findings on the potential it holds for training ministry students.

Christian Formation in Practical Public Theology

Practical public theology engages questions concerning life together in a political community. Forming Christians in practical public theology draws on biblically informed principles and the experience of community in the church. It fosters a conception of public life that is wider than the strictly political, enabling responses with the resources and capacities of spheres beyond government alone. It cultivates a disposition to discern the multiple theological principles in many concerns of our common life and attention to multiple factors from the perspectives of practitioners in other spheres. Finally, practical public theology equips Christians to recognize more than material dimensions in challenges facing individuals and communities and to respond relationally, through loving service to all neighbors. KEYWORDS: Practical public theology, formation, creation, cultural mandate, common grace, image of God, stewardship, poverty, conscience, gender identity

Spiritual (Mal)Formation

The Christian life is not static, but marks an expected, if often unspecified, trajectory of growth into maturity. The study of these practices that encourage growth is often called “Spiritual Formation,” and yet a survey of recent literature in the field reveals no real consensus regarding the definition for this process or its objectives. This essay will attempt to bring clarity to the practice of Christian formation through an analysis of the concept of formation, three key scriptural warrants, the role of the Church in its execution, and especially to the telos of formation. While typical accounts of Christian formation point to a vision for “Christlikeness” as the telos of its practices, in this essay I will argue that a more fundamental grounding—based on the nature of worship—should be located in the Triune Imago Dei. A given doctrine of God tacitly forms the ecclesiological environment in which a given Christian is being formed—or mal-formed.