Education as spiritual journey : applying the "inner experience" and "new awareness'' models of revelation to catechesis

Abstract

This essay will first seek to analyze the method of divine pedagogy in both the Old and the New testaments. It will show how God revealed Himself to man progressively, and in His divine providence, always found new ways and means to accompany human beings in their journey of life. Thus the notions of 'revelation' and 'life journey' could never be separated from each other. God educates man in His wisdom and knowledge while the latter journeys in a road that is characterized by anxieties, fears, anguish and despair on the one side, and joys, hope and empowerment on the other. Thus this essay will take the gospel account of Jesus' s journey with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus as a prototype model of divine pedagogy, a model that must guide every teacher of Religion and catechist in his/her work, in order to be able to educate in the same way as God taught us. The notion of revelation will be understood and discussed from the standpoint of two particular perspectives, namely the "inner experience" and the "new awareness" models of revelation. God could only be revealed through the everyday experiences that man passes through, and this revelation triggers within a human being an "inner experience" that eventually intensifies even within a communal faith experience and results in a "new awareness" of self, others, the world and ultimately God.