Vatican official says young people must learn to respect differences

Published: 2007-05-11

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Preparing future generations to thrive in a multicultural environment means teaching them to respect differences without trying to erase those differences, said the secretary of the Vatican's Congregation for Catholic Education. "Living together with our differences" requires more than tolerance, Archbishop J. Michael Miller told a conference of European education ministers in Istanbul, Turkey, in early May. The Vatican released a copy of his address May 11. While education is the key to an individual's intellectual and spiritual development, he told the conference, it also must "foster the overcoming of radical individualism" if it is to help people live in a multicultural environment. Education must prepare students for "building together a common destiny, striving for cooperation and fraternity (and) joining together on the road to shape our civilization," he said.

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