LAUNCH OF THE YEAR OF SAINT PAUL
The Year of Saint Paul was launched on the
Feast of the Apostles Peter and Paul,
June 29 2008.
The special year of grace was proclaimed by
Pope Benedict to mark the 2000th anniversary
of the birth of the Apostle of the Gentiles.
In Rome the Holy Father opened the year with special ceremonies during which he was accompanied by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I.
In Glasgow, Archbishop Conti addressed a special pastoral letter to the Archdiocese to launch the year, and published a decree establishing three centres within the diocese at which the Jubilee Indulgence can be obtained.
The Archbishop, in his letter, says: “It is a year in which to hear with fresh ears St Paul’s preaching; to reflect again on his marvellous example; and to seek his help in prayer. I invite my priestly co-operators and all teachers to give a lead. Places and times are suggested for imaginative efforts in regard to prayer. Our young people will be challenged to study St Paul’s life. And from the treasury of the Church we will all be able to seek and obtain those graces which we call “indulgences”.
Full text of the Archbishop’s Pastoral Letter
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Archbishop Addresses Newly Qualified Catholic Teachers
At a Mass for newly qualified Catholic teachers in the historic Bute Hall of Glasgow University, Archbishop Conti urged the new graduates to be authentic witnesses to their faith in the classroom and by their way of life. Quoting the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council, the Archbishop said: "Let teachers realise that to the greatest possible extent they determine whether the Catholic school can bring its goals and undertakings to fruition. They should, therefore, be trained with particular care so that they may be enriched with both secular and religious knowledge, appropriately certificated, and may be equipped with educational skills which reflects modern day findings...let them give witness to Christ, the unique teacher, by their lives as by their teachings."
Mass for Newly Qualified Teachers
Glasgow University
Monday June 23
Dear Graduands
Many will say that a University education is the gateway to success, and you yourselves will consider that your Graduation today opens the door to the teaching profession to you. You enter it today.
The teaching profession is one of the oldest and most important of all professions. The service teachers give to the community is indispensable in a civilised and increasingly developed society. One could argue that primary teachers are the most important of all since they provide primary education; they lay the foundations of learning. The skills they promote and values they establish are those on which the whole of education for life and work is built.
Others may pursue to a higher level knowledge in other fields of human endeavour and experience, but you provide the essential foundations.
I am referring to teachers in the professional sense but of course parents are the first teachers of their children and their words and example will have a profound effect on their children’s development – for good or bad.
All teachers act “in loco parentis” but primary teachers are those closest to home. One cannot stress enough the importance of your task. It is both by word and example that you educate those in your charge.
You know the etymology of that word “educate” – from the Latin educere – to lead out. Education is primarily developing the learning facility of individuals, drawing out their potential.
The church considers teaching, particularly conveying the knowledge of God, as a vocation – a calling, a work of grace.
St. Paul in addressing Timothy his disciple calls him – in God’s name – to teach the truth of God “in season and out of season”, or, as another translation has it, “welcome or unwelcome: refute falsehood, correct error, call to obedience, but do all with patience and with the intention of teaching… make the preaching of the good news your life’s work in thoroughgoing service”
Now Timothy may have been a priest – tradition has him a Bishop – but no one who knows God – no man or woman with faith will doubt that the greater part of his or her teaching responsibility is in establishing this truth – that God has made us and, as St Augustine added, made us for himself; that the motive of creation, perceived in his Son, is love, and that through him God has restored us to his favour in the Church by the shedding of his blood.
If this relationship – I mean God’s and ours – is right, all good will follow.
If this knowledge is held securely all other knowledge will find its reference part.
It provides the compass by which all else is calculated and ordered.
The Catholic school exists for this purpose and all of you are trained to fulfil your vocation in it.
Forty three years ago the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council signed a solemn declaration on education. In speaking of Catholic Schools it said: “no less than other schools does the catholic school pursue cultural goals and a natural development of young people. But it has several distinctive purposes.
“It aims to create for the school community an atmosphere (ethos) enlivened by the Gospel spirit of freedom and charity. It aims to help the young person in such a way that the development of his/her personality matches the growth of that new creation which he/she became by baptism.”
The document adds that the growth of the person’s faith will, “illumine the knowledge which he/she gradually gains of the world, of life, and of society”.
And then the document says the following: “Let teachers realise that to the greatest possible extent they determine whether the Catholic School can bring its goals and undertakings to fruition. They should, therefore, be trained with particular care so that they may be enriched with both secular and religious knowledge, appropriately certified, and may be equipped with educational skills which reflects modern day findings… let them give witness to Christ, the unique teacher, by their lives as by their teachings.”
Those among you charged with your training will be encouraged in their task by these words, as you, graduands will be by being “appropriate certified” – I think we had better use the phrase certificated!
You are certificated as having the educational skills for the fulfilment of what the declaration refers to as the “beautiful and truly solemn vocation” of teaching.
Finally let me underline that reference to witness – “Witness to Christ’s unique teacher” the document says. It was with intent that I commenced this homily by speaking of “gateway” and “door” – as today you enter this “beautiful and solemn” vocational profession.
We heard in the Gospel Jesus referring to himself as the gateway to the sheepfold, as the door as which the sheep enter in and which they leave. You need to think of yourselves in this light since you become in a true sense shepherds of those you teach, leading them to healthy pastures and still waters.
May the “unique teacher”, the Good Shepherd, inspire you all in your vocation and bless you in its fulfilment!
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