Macau, Macau

Symposium

Main Themes

  • The Ignatian Worldview and Jesuit Education
  • Ignatius' modus parisiensis and Ratio Studiorum
  • European praxis and Jesuit educational accommodation in Asia
  • Confucian model of education and Asian conception of Man
  • Asian Modern Experiences in Education
  • A Globalized World and crisis of Public Education
  • Education of Excellence and Power versus Alienating Education for less fortunate
  • Chicago Schools of Cristo Rey in service to the Society and Social Justice
  • New Trends: Distance Education
  • Emotional Intelligence and Education

Date:

  • 25-27 November, 2009

Location:

  • Inspiration Building, Institute For Tourism Studies

Languages:

  • English, Chinese (Mandarin)

Introduction

On the eve of worldwide commemoration of the fourth hundred anniversary of Matteo Ricci’s death (1610), The Macau Ricci Institute, faithful to the cultural and intellectual heritage of its great patron, would like to hold an International Symposium dedicated to the intellectual and humanistic Jesuit formation that Matteo Ricci has brought to China.

For Ricci as well as for his Jesuit companions, trained to find God in all things, the world of their life adventures was one and undivided, religious and secular. While following the footsteps of their Master, Ignatius of Loyola, the Jesuits, from very beginning, came to esteem education as an efficient way to serve people in their religious and ethical lives. With the help of the Spiritual Exercises, they learned to trust their hearts as a place of unique encounter with God, and consequently to trust the hearts of other people as places for similar encounters (S.E.22).

This kind of formation established a climate in which Jesuits expected to learn from one another. Consequently, a pattern of mutuality in learning began to characterize not only the life of the Jesuits but also the life of those with whom they shared their work and mission.

Such lifestyle was proper to Matteo Ricci who throughout well-established friendships based on mutual respect and appreciation, came to share his Western learning while accepting that coming from his Chinese friends. For him to be a man of learning and virtue meant to be a man who shared his learning and virtue with others while remaining open to the learning coming from his counterparts. This mutuality of learning exchange was a basic educational experience for Ignatius and his followers.

Nowadays, people care deeply about the tradition that has bound faith and culture together in an integrated view of education. Many want to reclaim its authenticity not only of goals but also of means. However, the secret of the success of Jesuit schools cannot be found in the Ratio Studiorum – it has been said that all the Renaissance school plans looked alike on paper. What made the 17th century Jesuit schools effective could only have been the element that is indispensable for every school that works well – good teaching. Nevertheless, it might be said that the Ignatian school of attention, reverence, and devotion is still capable of bridging gaps and translating competing values into generous, shared concerns of creating a new kind of learning community.

From the beginning, that inner experience was codified in the Constitutions of the Society of Jesus. There, Ignatius adapted divine wisdom to the secular reality of education and the schools. The Jesuits’ esteem for truth, their commitment to study and their ability to succeed academically eventually became part of the educational program for their schools called Ratio Studiorum. The empowerment of learning and professional competence integrated with the availability of service to all people, reach and poor, sophisticated and simple, young and old, produced a person of higher effectiveness and mobility, “a person with and for others “(Pedro Arrupe).

Organising Institutions

  • MACAU RICCI INSTITUTE
 

Stephan Ch. Kessler, S.J.

The “Ratio Studiorum” of the Jesuits History, Spirituality and Pedagogy of the Jesuit Plan of Studies

In the year 1599 the Jesuit order published in a tandem publication two decisive documents which influenced, modelled and shaped the modern understanding of spirituality and pedagogy worldwide: The official version of the directory for the giving of the Spiritual Exercises and the official Plan for Jesuit Education” (Ratio Studiorum). Both documents are different regarding subject and material and yet there is a coherence on a deeper level: While the first book, the Directory for giving retreats is a (teachers-) handbook for spiritual formation is the second a pragmatic and at the same time a pedagogical plan to organize studies and education.

1. The experience of God as teacher – Ignatius learns “to help the souls” In a deep personal crisis at the beginning of his interior way Ignatius of Loyola (1491-1556) experienced God as his teacher. With school vocabulary Ignatius describes how he learned to overcome compulsive religious sights and to leave ascetical hardships. God taught him the liberty to live his personal identity. In consequence Ignatius wanted to hand on this liberating school-experience. The word “to help the souls” became the motto for this ideal.

2. Education as pastoral activity – Formation becomes a Jesuit Apostolate Originally the Jesuit order was not designed for educational work but it became one of the most important Christian schooling initiatives. The first generation of Jesuits together with Ignatius discovered that schools fitted their pastoral ideal: Education was helping the souls.

3. The Jesuit belief in education – the Renaissance ideal of “learned piety” The 16th century with the humanistic movements and the discovery of new worlds became in a particular way an age of learning. The Jesuits adapted and adopted the optimistic views on human formation and followed the synthesis of “learned piety”.

4. Pedagogy as “Spiritual Exercise” – Educating “persons with and for others” The pedagogy of the “Ratio Studiorum” depends on a theological understanding of human beings: Man and women live in relationship to God, they answer his call. The Jesuit pedagogy therefore stresses the fact of responsibility for others and for the world.

Antonella Romano

The Understanding of the World: Knowledge, Disciplines and their Boundaries in the Elaboration of the Ratio Studiorum (1540-1599)

It took more than half a century for the Society of Jesus to offer the first printed version of the Ratio Studiorum (1599), a text related to the organization of the intellectual training of the Jesuits, as well as a general teaching program in the colleges under their control. The importance of the text is not only due to the multiplication of Jesuit schools all over the world between the 1540s and the 1770s, or to the fact that it became a crucial reference among all the educational enterprises, either catholic or protestant, during that period. It is also related to the broad process of negotiation between the local and the central levels of the Jesuit institution, which engendered an original intellectual reframing of the classical foundations of Christian culture to be understood as an answer to the spiritual and philosophical desegregation of the old Christianitas. My paper aims at analyzing the reconfiguration of Europe in the Renaissance world through a close study of the part that the Jesuits and their intellectual program played in it.

Angelo Cattaneo

Measuring, Calculating and Mapping: Science, Theology, and Pedagogy in the Work of 16th- and 17th- Century Jesuit Missionaries in Asia

In the Roman College established by the Jesuits in 1551, also known as “Omnium Nationum Seminarium”, students from throughout Europe underwent intense academic training, studying—in addition to theology (Scripturae)—rhetoric, the art of memory, philosophy and mathematical sciences, including arithmetic, geometry, perspective, cosmography, globes, astronomic tables, and astrolabes (the four latter called sphaera), clocks, music, mechanics, hydrography and architecture.

In this context, the research and instruction of mathematics—which, as established by Christophorus Clavius, teacher of Matteo Ricci, included geography and cartography—constituted a process of spiritual elevation, a journey toward salvation. Scientific rigour, then, operating under its own laws, while at the same time maintaining those of a moral, even meditative, path, acquired a theological function. The observation of the world, its knowledge and its measurement were believed to be a form of meditation (from the prospective of the contemptus mundi). Such a perception was inspired by a passage from the Apocalypse of Saint John (“rise and measure the temple of Jerusalem”)—which lay at the heart of the monastic tradition of meditation, a practice revived in the sixteenth century by the Jesuits, most notably by Saint Ignatius—as well as by classical-Christian philosophy (for example, by Macrobius’ fifth century Commentary on Cicero’s Dream of Scipio).

In light of these considerations, my paper will analyse the function of cartographic works at two levels: first, within the context of Jesuit pedagogy and scientific research during sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Jesuit missions in Asia, drawing on the lives and works of Fathers M. Ricci, G. Aleni, M. Martini and others. Second, their works will be evaluated within the broader theological, scientific and pedagogical episteme of the period, as portrayed by the most important cosmographic works of early modernity, including Ortelius’ Theatrum orbis terrarum and Mercator’s Cosmographiucae meditationes.

Finally, using this dual lens, I will focus on two particular functions of cartographic works: the scientific measurement and depiction of the imago mundi as a pedagogical, moral and meditative activity in the work of Jesuit missionaries; and the use of images (even those strictly scientific) as incentives for missionary activity during the first hundred years of Jesuit missions in Asia—as exemplified not only by the renowned works by Ricci and Martini, but also by the lesser known, though extraordinary cartographic images (biombos cartograficos), unprecedented unions of European, Chinese and Japanese cartography and world views, depicted in the context of the Painting Seminars organized by the Jesuit Giovanni Nicolao at Shiki (1592-1600), Arima (1601), Nagasaki (1603-1613) and in Macao (1614-1626).

Robert A. Maryks

Jesuit Ciceronian Humanism as an Element of Cross-cultural Encounters in China

The Jesuit pedagogical code known as Ratio Studiorum (1599) was a product of the experience of Jesuit teachers engaged in humanistic education in the second half of the sixteenth century. Nothing is more striking (and typical) of the Ratio than its obvious fascination with the elements of Ciceronian rhetoric: civic values, principle of accommodation, and epistemic probability. Jesuit missionaries who arrived to Asia in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were imbued with these Ciceronian ideals. It is not surprising, therefore, that the first book written in Chinese by Matteo Ricci was a treatise on friendship, Jiaoyou lun (1595), a clear imitation of Cicero’s On Friendship, or that the first book published by the Western printing press in Macao was Juan Bonifacio’s Christiani pueri institutio (1588)–a treatise that emphasized the use of Ciceronian rhetoric in education. This paper examines how Ciceronian rhetoric, embraced with such enthusiasm by Jesuits, made their early cross-cultural missionary encounters in Asia so remarkably thriving, and how those interactions might still be a source of inspiration for those engaged in education in contemporary China.

Ugo Baldini

The Teaching in Macao College, as Documented in the Collection “Jesuitas na Asia” (Lisbon, Biblioteca da Ajuda)

The basic information on courses taught in Macao’s Jesuit college (1593-1762) and the lecturers who gave them still remains that provided between 1968 and 1975 by J.F. Schütte’s outstanding Introductio ad historiam Societatis Jesu in Japonia 1549-1650 and Monumenta historica Japoniae I. Textus catalogorum Japoniae aliaeque de personis domibusque S. J. in Japonia informationes et relationes 1549 – 1654. As the titles show, however, his reconstruction stopped at the middle of the XVIIth century; in addition, the existence of other relevant documents has emerged after him, even if they have not been analyzed systematically. In particular, Schütte carefully examined the collection “Jesuitas na Asia” in Lisbon’s Biblioteca da Ajuda (which, as is commonly known, derives from the Jesuit Macao archive), and he published all the explicit information pertaining to the college. However, he did not collect not only data referring to post-1655 situations and events, but also a number of pre-1655 others scattered across documents concerning subjects different from the college or even from Macao’s Jesuit community. If united and compared with those published by him, and seen in the deeper and larger perspective which recent studies have made possible, these data allow a more detailed and less idealized reconstruction of the college’s role and activities. This paper only aspires to show the possibilities existing if also other relevant collections (as that in Madrid’s Academia de la Historia) shall be also searched “microscopically”.

Romulo da Silva Ehalt

"From pagan dross shall purify her ore" - Education and the Beginning of the Jesuit Mission in Japan

In 1549, Francis Xavier ended his journey from Malacca to Satsuma to become the first Jesuit to arrive in Japan, thus starting the Japanese mission which supported the expansion of Christianity in the country for the next one hundred years. The current paper will try to examine the various aspects regarding the beginnings of the Jesuit education in the Japanese mission and its role as one of the main instruments used by the missionaries to conquer hearts and souls in the Far East. Some of these aspects will be the instructions and plans described by Francis Xavier in his many writings concerning the Japanese mission and the role of education to the mission, the impact of the library brought by Melchor Nunes Barreto in 1556 from Goa to Japan, the transference of the mission headquarters from Yamaguchi to Bungo and later to the Omura area, the question of native clergy among the first missionaries, their philosophical disputes with the Buddhist monks and the influence of the political and social instability of the country.

Roland Jacques 杨有仁

Jesuit Pioneers in 17th Century Vietnam and Educational Interaction

When the Jesuits first landed in present day central Vietnam in 1615 their attention was entirely focused on Japan. They ministered to a small flock of Japanese refugees in the hope that the Empire would soon open up again to their presence. Collectively they could cash in on a long experience of Jesuit missioning in Japan, whith which they got acquainted in the St Paul College in Macao.

However, in Vietnam things were different; for lack of freedom the Japanese model could not be reproduced. Some of the Jesuits realised that the Vietnamese nation was a mission field in its own right. In this Francisco de Pina was the real pioneer.

When he landed in 1617, Pina was a gifted young man of 32 hailing from Portugal. While still tending to the Japanese he started with passion studying the local language and culture. He surrounded himself with young Vietnamese converts, called dójuku after their Japanese counterpart. In his plans they were key to the future. Once fully educated in their own tradition and familiar with the rudiments of Portuguese, they would become partners in a novel inter-cultural venture.

When Pina accidentally died in December 1625, he had spent over a year training Alexandre de Rhodes, the most famous missionary of Vietnam. The disciple carried on and brought to full fruition the ideas of his master. De Rhodes organised the catechists into the “House of God.” This became the cornerstone of the Jesuit mission in Vietnam, and remained thriving when the Paris Foreign Missions, the Spanish Dominicans and others took over.

This masterpiece of Jesuit pedagogy explains in great part the “Vietnamese exception,” i.e., the success of christianity in a country surrounded by peoples who had little use for it. Countless groups in present-day Vietnam claim to be their immediate heirs and successors.

Anh Q. Tran, S.J.

Jesuit Contribution to Vietnam’s Education: Past and Present

Through the vicissitudes of history, the Jesuits labored twice in Vietnam (first wave: 1615-1773; second wave: 1957-present). Except for the short-lived St Pius X Seminary (1958-1977), the Jesuits have not established any institution of learning. However, the Jesuit pedagogical influence was strongly felt throughout Vietnamese society and the Church, both in the seventeenth century and in the latter half of the twentieth century. For instance, the Jesuits were responsible for creating a Latinized alphabet and a grammar book that became the basis for the modern form of Vietnamese writing, forming an “Institution of Catechists” which evolved into the first native clergy, and contributed to the formation of Vietnamese clergy after they returned to Vietnam the second time.

The key to the contribution of Jesuit missionaries to the education in Vietnam is not found in a well-planned Ratio Studiorum, but in their ability to adapt to circumstances, and more importantly, in their collaboration with other religious and laity. From the seventeenth century to present day, the Jesuits have engaged in an active dialogue with Vietnamese culture in the service of its people. Although at present Vietnamese Jesuits are not allowed to open any educational institution, they continue to be involved in the formation of men and women, both spiritually through the ministry of giving the Spiritual Exercises, and intellectually through their research, writing, and teaching of various religious women and men, seminarians, and diocesan clergy. For the Jesuits in Vietnam, education is not primarily expressed in academic learning, but aims at empowering people to examine their experience, recognize their gifts, and become leaders in their own circumstances.

白莉民 Bai Limin

Li Wenyu and Xixue Guanjian (Key to Western Learning)

Li Wenyu (1840 – 1911), was a classmate of Ma Xiangbo (1840 – 1939) at the College St. Ignace. Like Ma, Li was among the first Jesuit novices recruited from the Major Seminary in 1862, and was ordained as a priest in the Shanghai mission in 1872. After Ma Xiangbo left the Jesuit order in 1876, ► Li filled the position left by Ma and became the principal of the College, and also the first Chinese editor of a Chinese-Catholic newspaper Yiwen lu 益聞錄 which had been published since December 1878; later it became Huibao 匯報(Revue Pour Tous).

While Ma Xiangbo is well known for his devotion to the establishment of modern education in China, Li’s activities in promoting science and education are less well known. In fact, the first Chinese Catholic newspaper he edited, together with the works he translated into Chinese from the West, contained a considerable amount of content relevant to the spread of scientific knowledge in China. Among Li’s translated works, the book “Xixue Guanjian” 西學關鍵(Key to Western Learning), a translation of A Guide to the Scientific Knowledge of Things Familiar by Rev Dr Ebenezer Cobham Brewer (1810 – 1897), stood out as a great contribution to China’s wave of the new learning.

This paper is structured around the political and social context of 1903 when Li’s translation was published and when the Qing government had just issued a proclamation to establish a modern school system, and to integrate the content of Western learning into traditional Chinese education. It examines the motivation and significance of Li’s translation based on a textual reading of Li’s own statement and forewords to the book by other influential reformers and educators. A further investigation of the educational activities and curriculum at the Zi-ka-wai orphanage at the time may also provide the rationale behind Li’s translation and publication of Xixue Guanjian 西學關鍵, which may shed light on the Jesuit educational accommodation in China; and more importantly, illustrate the contribution the Jesuit Society in Shanghai made to the development of modern education in early twentieth-century China.

李天纲 Li Tiangang

Zikawei -- T’ou-se-wei: the Origin of Modern Shanghai Culture

Xujiahui or Ziccawei that had originated from the tomb of Paul Hsu Kuang-ch’I (1562–1633), a distinguished Chinese Catholic convert, developed into a well-known Catholic community after the 1840’s. From the T’ou-se-wei (Tushanwan) orphanages, a charity facility built by the members of the Society of Jesus, ► grew the earliest and largest base of arts and crafts in modern China. Together with T’ou-se-wei, Ziccawei has become one of the fountainheads of modern Shanghai culture. Ziccawei--T’ou-se-wei area can be called the “Latin Quarter in Shanghai” on the cultural map of modern China. Ziccawei--T’ou-se-wei, created by the Society of Jesus, belongs to the Catholic Church in China. Since it was built on the basis of the rich cultural resources of modern Shanghai and since people of all walks of life in Shanghai were involved in this cultural construction, it is an inseparable part of the Shanghai culture. Since it belongs to the “Shanghai culture”, it is naturally part of the “Chinese culture”. What is more, as Ziccawei--T’ou-se-wei is part of the outstanding culture that came into being in the process of globalization during the 19th and 20th centuries, it is also a kind of world cultural heritage. It indicates that people of all over the world can gather in Shanghai, a globalized metropolis, and create together a “new culture” that belongs to all mankind.

锺志邦 Choong Chee Pang

The Catholicity of Christian Studies in Modern Chinese Academia

The theme of the Symposium is “Education for New Times: Revisiting Pedagogical Models in the Jesuit Tradition”. The paper will try to be consistent with the philosophy of education and spirit of the Jesuit tradition as well as it being in-line with a couple of the sub-themes of the Symposium. There is also a personal dimension to the topic of the paper, because the writer himself has been personally involved in Christian studies in modern Chinese academia since 1988, when he was first invited by Peking (Beijing) University to lecture on the history of Christian thought. The key word of the paper is “catholicity” - the “catholicity” of Christian studies in modern Chinese academia. Catholicity is here interpreted and understood from the following perspectives.

1. Catholicity in terms of global outlook. It was the late Deng Xiao Ping's “open door” policy that first had given Christian studies a new lease of life in modern Chinese academia from the early 1980s. As such, it was quite reasonable and natural that it should have begun with a global outlook right from the start. This global outlook is shared among universities and academic institutions which are committed to the promotion of Christian studies in modern China.

2. Catholicity in terms of inclusive and ecumenical understanding of “Christianity”. For a very long time in China and for historical and other related reasons Roman Catholicism and Protestantism have been commonly regarded and perceived as almost two separate and distinctive religions. In Christian studies in modern Chinese academia, however, “Christianity” is often taken inclusively and ecumenically to include both Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. This has been well expressed by the four characters in Chinese: ji du zhong jiao, which could literally and broadly mean “Christian religion” or “the religion of Christ”. These four Chinese characters may sometimes even broadly or vaguely include the Orthodox tradition. This point becomes the more significant in China, where rather regrettably, contact and fellowship between the Catholic and the Prostestant have been very minimal both corporately and individually.

3. Catholicity in interdisciplinary context. Christian studies are seldom conducted in isolation from other academic disciplines in modern Chinese academia. Instead, they are often done in interdisciplinary context, making it more relevant and challenging, and hence generally more welcome by the academic communities. “Catholicity” in this case also means those scholars and students who are involved in Christian studies have come from quite diverse backgrounds, both in terms of academic disciplines as well as religious identity, or the lack of it, ranging from a minority of committed Christians to a much larger number of people who have no religious profession, including those who are outright atheists. The paper will conclude with an overview of the present state of the subject with some speculation on its future development and possible direction.

何建明 He Jianmin

The Enlightenment of Jesuit Educational Principle of Modern China to the Present Time

Taking the examples of Collège Saint Ignace in Shanghai, Fu Jen Community on Fragrant Hill of Beijing, Aurora University, Fu Jen Catholic University, and Institut des Hautes Etudes et Commerciales, this article emphatically analyzed each school’s principle and target of running a school, policy of teaching, employment of teachers and the set-up of subjects, as well as the contents and features of students’ management and educational practice. The article points out that the Jesuits did carry out the purpose of “missionary education” in its establishment of secondary schools and universities in contemporary China, but because it was influenced by its own traditional principle of education, as well as the patriotic thinking of “Save Our Motherland” of the local Chinese Jesuits, its principle and practice of education showed a striking feature of combining the nature of the world and China, scientism and academism, scientism and humanism. The target and method of education of the Jesuits, manifested in the academic education connecting the East and the West through language teaching, the personality development perfecting one’s life through moral cultivation, and the civil education promoting the fulfillment of one’s responsibilities through the spirit of service, will positively inspire the modern education on how to make a breakthrough in the dilemma of nationalism, individualism and specialism.

Kim Woo-Seon, S.J.

“Success” of a Jesuit University in the Mission Context: The Case of Sogang University in Korea

Sogang University (hereafter, Sogang), the Jesuit university in Korea, has won a high reputation in Korea in spite of its short history of 50 years. What has made this “success” possible and what are the unintended consequences of this success? These are the questions my paper aims to examine.

Owing to its high rank among Korean universities, Sogang is popularly considered a successful university. Jesuit circles tends to find its factor in Jesuit pedagogy and the missionaries’ sacrificial commitment. However, in addition to this, my paper argues that the following two factors are significant to bring this success:

First, at an institutional level, the new pedagogy that Sogang university has brought to Korea’s higher educational system has contribute to this success. The new pedagogy and educational program brought by Jesuits includes personal care for students by faculty, English education, new curricula, modern open library, the management of academic program by rule rather than by personal preference.

Second, at the international level, the international relationship between the United States and Korea after the Word War II has worked favourably for Sogang whose founders were Jesuits from America.

However, the context of Sogang has changed. It includes an update of the Korean universities, the leadership change of the US missionaries to local Jesuits at Sogang, the change in Korea-USA relations, and the intensification of global competition among universities. These changes have meant the loss of strength Sogang has suffered. Thus, it needs a new Jesuit university model. In conclusion, in spite of structural constrain of the Jesuits’ influence on Sogang, my paper suggests that Sogang needs a new understanding of “success” which can convey Jesuit identity and mission beyond mere high rank or the amount of funding.

Ruben de Freitas Cabral 鲁本文

New Times for Education: Issues of Development and Fairness

“The world is full of people who have never, since childhood, met an open doorway with an open mind.” These words from E. B. White, a famous American writer and winner of the Pulitzer Prize, apply perfectly to discussions about education. First, there is the prevalent confusion of schooling with education. Second, the existence of stated philosophy and goals rarely corresponds to the daily ethos of the school; third, the question of education as a right or a duty of citizens in a democracy surfaces rarely. In this case, education for new times is really new times for education. It is a question as old as humanity itself.

Gary Menard, S.J.

Cristo Rey Schools: Jesuit Secondary Education That Works for the Urban Center

Jesuit education began in 1548, when the first Jesuit school opened in Messina, Italy. Since then, our schools have grown in quality and prestige to serve the elite of many countries. Cristo Rey schools are a new generation of Jesuit secondary schools designed to serve students from economically impoverished families. The academic program helps students fill in the gaps in their primary education and prepares students for university-level course work.

High quality, college-prep education is expensive, and our target audience cannot af-ford to pay the $10,000 annual cost for each student. The innovative Corporate Work-Study Program gives each student a part-time job and makes high-quality education affordable. Students earn more than half of their tuition, gain professional experience in the corporate world, and learn about the professional opportunities that await them if they stay in school and continue onto university.

Cristo Rey schools currently operate in twenty four cities in the United States and serve 5,000 young people. Their success is remarkable: high graduation rates, valuable uni-versity scholarships, and wider opportunity for students who are typically the first person in their family to attend university. The Jesuit tradition of education is alive and well in the Cristo Rey Schools, continuing to serve young people and build a better society.

Martin Scroope

Learning to Serve – Serving to Learn The Characteristics of Jesuit Education & Ignatian Pedagogy 1

The first Jesuit school was founded at Messina, Sicily, in 1548. Within eight years another 40 schools were founded. By 1773, apart from 176 seminaries for the training of priests, and 15 universities, the Jesuits were conducting ► 640 secondary schools in various parts of the world. The Order was then suppressed to be restored in 1814. Today the Jesuits conduct 231 higher education institutions; 462 secondary schools; 187 primary schools; 70 technical & professional institutions, (with 1,413,640 students) and 2,947 Fe Y Alegria networks (with 1,516,166 students) all in 70 countries, in total educating some 2,928,806 students.2

The original plan of study in these schools was called the Ratio Studiorum (1599).3 It was derived from the system being used in the University of Paris at the time of St Ignatius. Combining medieval scholasticism stressing critical analysis, evaluation, communication, with a humanism stressing active learning drama, plays, competitions, it established rules, methods and principles which would enable Jesuits to achieve better their aims in education. Education was not just for education sake, it was also apostolic, educating mainly men, to work for the betterment of others. For this teachers needed to be erudite, clear-sighted, generous and influential.

The Characteristics of Jesuit Education (1986) are an indicative not prescriptive blueprint for Jesuit education today. They may be summarised as follows: Jesuit Education is;

• world-affirming and contributes to a students total formation, including religious

• centred on individual student needs, encouraging life-long openness to growth

• value-oriented and encourages reflection on personal and human experience

• modeled on Christ and his life; promoting prayer, worship and service

• preparing students for an active life commitment, for a “faith that does justice”

• of service to the Church, in the world

• pursuing excellence in its work of formation and witnesses to excellence

• taking place within a structure that promotes community

• true to the vision of Ignatius and Jesuit education

Ignatian Pedagogy a practical approach to teaching finds its inspiration in the life experiences of St Ignatius Loyola, especially the dynamic of his Spiritual Exercises.4 The relationship between a teacher, student and the truth at hand, lived through the process of experience, reflection and action enables freedom for learning and self understanding to be experienced by all.

1This abstract and presentation in November are based on The Characteristics of Jesuit Education (1986) and Ignatian Pedagogy a Practical Approach (1993). (The International Commission of the Apostolate of Jesuit Education. Rome) The title Learning to Serve and Serving to Learn takes its inspiration from the Australian Jesuit Provinces’ mission statement for schools. “In the name of Jesus, in the spirit of Ignatius, companions for a faith that does justice, learning to serve, serving to learn”.

2www.sjweb.info/education/stats.cfm

3Gabriel Codina sj “The Modus Parisiensis” The Jesuit Ratio Studiorum 400th Anniversary Perspectives. (Fordham University Press. New York, 2000)

4Spiritual Exercises “denotes every way of examining one’s conscience, of meditating, of contemplating, of praying vocally and mentally, and other spiritual actions…of preparing and making ourselves ready to get rid of all disordered affections so that, once rid of them, one might seek and find the divine will in regard to the disposition of one’s life for the salvation of the soul.” Michael Ivens sj. The Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. (Newton Printing London. 2004.)

Bradley McLean 孟伯

New Trends in Online Theological Education: Successes and Challenges for the Future

This paper will discuss the relevance and use of online learning for theological education. Critics of online learning have sometimes argued against the disembodied nature of virtual education, and contrasted its supposed shortcomings with the benefits of tradition face-to-face interaction. However, new models of online teaching make good use of so-called ‘hybrid’ models of theological distance learning.

This paper will explain how hybrid models work, and assess their benefits over against earlier models. It will then go on to explain two important aspects of online learning, namely, community building and participation in teaching. Finally, this paper will argue that when online courses give due attention to both hospitality and effective pedagogical strategies, online learning environments have the potential to build strong communities of faith and learning.

侯永琪 Hou Yung -chi

The Impact of Quality Assurance and Ranking on Jesuit Higher Education from Taiwan’s Perspective

Under “University Law” revised in 2005, all Taiwan universities and colleges are required to be assessed regularly with regard to standards and procedures by accrediting agencies chartered by the Ministry of Education. However, in recent years, as a result of being pressured by severe international competition, Taiwan universities and colleges started to pay more attention to global and national rankings rather than to national accreditation. In response to international competition in higher education most higher education institutions have been working hard to improve their quality and rank and Jesuit colleges and universities are no exception. These Jesuit colleges are typically characterized by Catholicism, contributing to their educational mission, that is, the knowledge, love of God and the salvation of souls.

The main theme of this paper is to search for the very meaning of quality assurance and ranking in higher education and their impact on Jesuit colleges and universities in Taiwan.

Alfred Deignan, S.J. 狄恆

Jesuit Education in Hong Kong – Growth and Development

Education is always challenging. We can never say that we have all the answers. It is an ongoing process of discovery which has always to adapt to change – change of needs, environment, facilities and resources. The best possible education available some years ago is now outdated. Once we educated mainly through chalk and talk. Now we educate using student activity, the internet, T.V., videos and films. Education grows and adapts to the ways and needs of the day.

Jesuits arrived in Hong Kong in 1926 and soon became involved in education. The first responsibility given to them was to build and run Ricci Hall, a student residence of the University of Hong Kong while some Fathers lectured in the University. In 1931 the new Regional Seminary was opened and the Jesuits were asked to staff it. Finally in 1932the Jesuits took over the running of Wah Yan College Hong Kong, their first involvement in secondary education. Later in 1952 they took over another secondaryschool Wah Yan College, Kowloon.

The education provided might be called “traditional Jesuit education” with its emphasis on excellence and moral values. The methodology used included lectures imparting knowledge, with exercises by students, debates, dramas, competitions and of course a variety of physical games. Underlying all this was Christian moral values using the Bible.

A significant growth occurred in 1980 after the Jesuits published the “Characteristics of Jesuit Education” with its emphasis on student activity, critical analysis, values and service – with its aim to help students to become “persons of competence, conscience and compassion”. Following this in 1993 came “Ignatian Pedagogy – A Practical Approach”. This provided a methodology of teaching, taking into account modern research in education and learning and emphasizing reflection on experience.

Growth and development in Jesuit education in Hong Kong is in trying to implement this Ignatian Pedagogy with its five points – context, experience, reflection, action and evaluation. We say there is no growth without reflection. There is a wonderful quotation from Theodore Roosevelt; “To educate a person in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society” Jesuit education aims to provide persons of moral character - “men and women for others.”