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Robert Schuman’s vision as a cure for “modern” Europe’s moral crisis

Imitating and promoting Schuman's ideas requires a practical dimension, just as he undertook specific actions implementing reconciliation, solidarity and peace between people and nations - writes the president of the board of the Schuman Institute of Thought Zbigniew Krysiak in "Political Theology Every Week": "Schuman's Europe.

 

The beatification process of Robert Schuman is underway in the Vatican. In 2006, the Vatican Congregation for the Causes of Saints positively approved the decree on the validity of the diocesan stage, which had previously been started by Bishop Metz Pierre Raffin in France. During the diocesan stage, over 750 documents related to Robert Schuman’s life and activity were collected and over 200 witnesses were heard.

Schuman’s legacy contributed significantly to building unity, solidarity and peace in Europe. However, his work has not been completed and needs to be continued.

The paradigm of current EU leaders is Altiero Spinelli’s philosophy of superstate, which is a complete negation of Schuman’s idea. Spinelli’s legacy aims to remove Christian values ​​from the public space, which he considers an enemy in the implementation of the European Union’s current form. At the same time, this philosophy destroys not only Christianity but also democracy. As Robert Schuman said:

“Democracy [in Europe] will be Christian or it will not be. Anti-Christian democracy would be a caricature aimed at plunging into tyranny or anarchy. A democrat’s position can be expressed in this way: he cannot accept the fact that the state systematically ignores religious reality, that it opposes its bias bordering on hostility or contempt. The state cannot fail to recognize, without harm caused to itself, the extraordinary effectiveness of religious inspiration in practising civic virtues (…)”

Schuman also empahsized the importance of respecting every nation in its specificity:

“The term “democracy” cannot be applied to a system that refuses to recognize the existence of a nation, that is a living community that possesses its own authentic heritage, which has its aspirations and mission, which it wants to fulfill in complete freedom; it cannot be referred to a regime that rejects the very idea of ​​freedom and personal responsibility, which suppresses various tendencies and assessments by force, calling them criminal deviations (…)”

Source and image: teologiapolityczna.pl

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