Learn…
With the month of May comes the end of the school year,
and for us it is also the time for the administration of the sacraments
in the villages.
And it is also an opportunity to reflect on education...
These
days many state schools are closing their activities. At the start of
the 2021-22 school year, the state forced everyone to delay the start of
schools, setting it for October 18. Now it has brought forward the exam
dates for the various licenses between the end of May and the beginning
of June. Many schools have made the various ballots, and the pupils
are at home ...
We, in our schools, will continue until the end of June, in order to have a "normal" school year.
In
addition to the teaching times, there is also the problem of teaching
methods: almost everything is done "by heart", memorization, and what
little the students think is stuck, but much disappears within a few
months. This method of learning begins in elementary school, and
continues until high school: the teacher writes a summary of the lesson
on the blackboard, and the pupils have to write everything down in their
notebooks. Any effort of personal work and research is systematically
discouraged, in addition to the fact that the books are not there,
and/or are not available.
The worst thing is that above all there
is a lack of reflection and reasoning: boys and girls often do not know
how to make a logical step, a procedure.
In these months I have
been preparing the administration of the sacraments in the villages
(Baptisms, First Communions, Confirmations and Weddings). To do this, I
step from village to village to take a "catechism exam": together with
the catechist, we ask the candidates questions. Often the answers "by
heart" are correct, but I also try to understand how much they have
understood, and how they reflect on the Faith and the Christian
adventure.
On Thursday and last Saturday I took the exams in the
villages of Dobere, Balembe and Barka Bongo. On Sunday I returned to
Dobere (50 km away), where I celebrated Mass, in which children and
adults received the various passages of the catechumenate: Salt (for the
first year), Oil (for those of the second year) , and Baptisms. There
were 12, children, young people and adults, who received baptism.
Nadège and Germain celebrated their wedding.
It i was a long
ceremony (almost 3 hours), but dense and very participatory. In the end,
everyone celebrated, with dances and songs, at the catechist's house.
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| Dobere, trasporto acqua Dobere, le transport de l'eau |
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