Sense and Nonsense: In the Capital of Modernity

In 1981, I collected the addresses that John Paul II had to that time given to university students and faculties. Each fall, the Holy Father addresses students of ecclesiastical universities and later of state universities in Rome. In the January 8, 1997, English edition of L’ Osservatore Romano, I noticed that the Mass for Italian university students was held in St. Peter’s on December 12. Since this group contained French students studying in Italian universities, John Paul II mentioned the World Youth Day scheduled for Paris in August 1997.

I was amused at how the Holy Father described this occasion: “There, in the heart of modernity, together we will give testimony to the splendor of the truth that emanates from the light of Christ.” What amused me was his calling Paris “the heart of modernity,” wherein he proposed to the youth to “give testimony” to “the splendor of truth” not just that emanates from science but from Christ. Splendor of truth, Veritatis Splendor, is of course the title of his encyclical on the nature and purpose of intellect. All belong together to this remarkable man—the youth, himself, truth, the heart of modernity.

Speaking in St. Peter’s to the Italian students and faculty, the pope fondly recalled “the custom of meeting the university students of Krakow, where the university apostolate developed in difficult times, times during which the Marxist regime was making a systematic effort to spread atheism.” The remark made me wonder if the atmosphere of our universities is not in fact more difficult than in the days of Krakow to which the pope referred.

But the pope recalls what he himself learned in those days, itself mentioned in Crossing the Threshold of Hope, namely, his “discovery of the fundamental importance of youth.” He implies that we can live our whole lives and never really know “what is youth?” It is not just a number of years, say fifteen to the middle twenties. Rather, “it is a time given by Providence to every person and given to him as a responsibility.”

“A responsibility for what?” we might ask. The pope again recalls the young man of the Gospel, so prominently in Veritatis Splendor. This youth looks “for answers to basic questions; he searches not only for the meaning of life but also for a concrete way to go about living his life.” The questions have to do with the meaning of life and the way to live that meaning. “The most fundamental characteristic of youth,” John Paul II adds, is to have these questions.

One might ask whether our chronological youth today are in fact able to formulate the basic questions of life, the answers to which they seek. If they do, we might argue that they must do so outside of academic circles wherein such questions are often deliberately obscured, relativized, or forbidden. The pope here hints that university students—youth who look for answers and want to know how to live—must accept their own responsibility when the universities they attend are in fact closed societies about the highest things.

The pope next adds a Christian dimension to the questions, answers, and possible ways concretely to live out youthful lives. He challenges the Italian students to deepen their Christian “awareness” and hence the “consequences” of their behavior. If we formulate the basic questions properly, a Christian dimension will be evident in the answers and in behavior. Clearly, these students would not bother to go to St. Peter’s if they thought that everything that they would hear there could just as easily be found in their academies. They know what they hear will be direct, distinct.

What follows then is “what does it mean to be a Christian?” The first thing it means is that “we are aware of the redemption carried out by Christ.” Surely this awareness is found in few classrooms. The pope also implies something that no youth can honestly be unaware of in his own life: namely, that something is wrong, that he does not do what he ought, that he finds a conflict in his members. He does what he would not. Intently gazing at them, the Holy Father tells them, “Each one of us is redeemed.”

When I read that, I thought, “Wow, this man tells the truth!” He adds, “Redeemed are our souls and our bodies. Redeemed are marriage and the family; people and nations.” He does not say that they “will be redeemed,” but that they already are redeemed. He does not mean all is well with them. The pope is not a follower of Rousseau. But once they have the questions, answers are available to them. Redemption is still through suffering.

Author

  • Fr. James V. Schall

    The Rev. James V. Schall, SJ, (1928-2019) taught government at the University of San Francisco and Georgetown University until his retirement in 2012. Besides being a regular Crisis columnist since 1983, Fr. Schall wrote nearly 50 books and countless articles for magazines and newspapers.

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