A New Silk Road Begins from Venice. It´s Called "Marcianum"
It is a center of studies very dear to the pope. Patriarch Scola conceived it. Cardinal Sodano inaugurated it. It looks toward the East and Islam, even as far as China
by Sandro Magister
ROMA - An altogether special school was born in Venice on April 24. It is so special that the cardinal secretary of state, Angelo Sodano, went to inaugurate it as John Paul II´s representative. The school´s Latin name is "Studium Generale Marcianum," from the name of Mark the Evangelist, the patron of the city. It has no equal in the world.
It was planned by Angelo Cardinal Scola, who has been the patriarch of Venice for two years, and before that was the rector of the Pontifical Lateran University, the most official of the Roman theological faculties, the pope´s cardinal vicar, Camillo Ruini, being its Grand Chancellor.
Thus at the origin of the Marcianum lies Scola´s accumulated experience as a university rector, and even before that as a professor of theology, as a disciple of Hans Urs von Balthasar, Henri de Lubac, and Joseph Ratzinger, as the founder of the international theological periodical "Communio," and as an educator of the young in the ranks of Communion and Liberation, the movement founded by Fr. Luigi Giussani.
But the Marcianum also has geographical roots. This is Venice, a city and diocese that has always been open to the farthest reaches of the world: from Byzantium to Islam to China. These three areas are more crucial than ever for the Church of today and tomorrow: the Orthodox Christian world, the Muslim world, and the Chinese giant.
A center of integral Christian education and a bridge between civilizations: these are the two distinctive traits of the Studium Generale Marcianum.
And these are the two reasons why the Marcianum is so near at heart for the leaders of the Roman Church.
The first reason - the seamlessness of the educational system - can be seen from the assembly of levels that compose the Marcianum. There are kindergarten and elementary schools, a high school, a theological faculty with its various levels, a faculty of canon law, and schools of specialization, all integrated with each other. The levels of high school and upwards are situated in one complex, that of Santa Maria della Salute in front of the basilica of St. Mark, which is also a seminary and boasts a magnificent library of ancient and modern works.
But its more profound unity has to do with the object and subject of instruction.
While in the secular educational systems and universities the object of knowledge is fragmented according to disciplines, measured by its practical utility, and detached from philosophical and religious ties, the ambition of the Marcianum is to bring all of instruction back to "a place where truth, truth in its purity, is sought, not for other ends, but for itself" (thus Cardinal Scola, citing a German thinker of the first half of the 1900´s, Romano Guardini).
As for the subject of education, Scola indicates it in the "Christian faith as the unitive principle for the interpretation of the objects of the diverse forms of knowledge: a faith that does not only mortify, but exalts the complete openness and the receptivity proper to reason."
The second distinctive trait of the Marcianum - as a bridge between civilizations - makes its mark in what will be the center´s official magazine, entitled "Oasis / Al-Waha / Naklistan": the second title being the Arabic word for "oasis" and the third the same in Urdu, the language spoken in India and Pakistan.
The first edition of "Oasis" will be released in January of 2005, and its 3,000 copies will go, for the most part, to African and Asian countries with a Muslim majority, the rest going to Europe, especially the countries of Eastern Europe.
The magazine will be in English, Arabic, and Urdu, and in the future in Indonesian. Above all, it will be aimed at the Christian minorities in those "mission" countries.
Because it is precisely the missionary nature of the Church that is the ultimate and stated reason for the Marcianum, the reason that sums up all others in itself: to give witness and "give an account of the hope that lies within us" (1 Peter 3:15)
The Marcianum will be in full operation next autumn. But its faculty of canon law, for example, has already been functioning for a year, with students arriving from Croatia, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, India, Sri Lanka, Kenya, Congo, and Brazil. Its faculty is assimilated to the Pontifical Holy Cross University, based in Rome and owned by Opus Dei.
Two cardinals sit on the academic board of the Marcianum: Austrian Christoph Schönborn, archbishop of Vienna, and Hungarian Peter Erdö, archbishop of Budapest.
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The website of the Marcianum:
> Studium Generale MarcianumAnd that of the diocese, with the biography of Angelo Cardinal Scola:
> Patriarcato di Venezia__________
English translation by Matthew Sherry:
> traduttore@hotmail.comGo to the home page of
> www.chiesa.espressonline.it/english, to access the latest articles and links to other resources.
Sandro Magister´s e-mail address is
s.magister@espressoedit.it
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30.4.2004
