Credit: Wuttichai Jantarak/Shutterstock / nullVatican City, Apr 11, 2022 / 02:45 am (CNA).What makes a school or university Catholic? As far as universities are concerned, Pope John Paul II answered this question with his apostolic constitution Ex corde Ecclesiae in 1990, which established criteria to regulate the work of universities that called themselves Catholic. Although Ex corde Ecclesiae is considered a general guideline for all Catholic educational institutions, there is curiously only one reference to it in the Vatican Congregation for Catholic Education s recent instruction on Catholic schools. The rather extensive document, called "The Identity of the Catholic School for a Culture of Dialogue," is a practical guide for all schools that want to claim the title of Catholic.The instruction had been in the works for years. In 2015, a congress on Catholic education took place in the Vatican and the Congregation immediately set to work on a "directory" for all
The Identity of the Catholic School for a Culture of Dialogue On March 29, 2022, The Congregation for Catholic Education released a new “Instruction” for Catholic educational institutions focusing on the identity of Catholic schools and on current challenges. The document is dated January 25, 2022, the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul the Apostle.
VATICAN CITY (CNS) Holding together the obligation to protect and promote the Catholic identity of Catholic schools while reaching out to a broader community of students and teachers requires a commitment to dialogue, said a new document from the Congregation for Catholic Education.