In this special year of the 350th anniversary of the birth of Saint John Baptist De La Salle, we continue with the theme of the "Lasallian spirituality" which is derived from him. It is built on the four pillars of faith, compassion, prayer and practical action. The aspect of faith is analysed in the article by Gilles Baudet, while De La Salle's ideas on prayer are presented by Bill Mann. The need for compassion is set out by Terry Collins in his analysis of some scriptural passages, and the need for practical action is demonstrated in the whole discussion relating to the place of PSHE in a Catholic school, which was the theme for the recent LACE Conference at the beginning of October.
Jesus had compassion on the crowds. We are told this many times by the gospel writers. Our cover picture can be used as a visual aid to stimulate thoughts on the subject. It is by L.S. Lowry and is entitled "Waiting for the shop to open". In it, we see a crowd of people from Salford in the years of the Depression. They are very ordinary people. They are hungry people. They are patient and trusting. They are waiting in the hope and faith for the door to open and for food to become available. As we look at them we can think of the scene described in Mark 8.1-4: A great crowd had gathered, and they had nothing to eat. He called his disciples and said to them, "I have compassion on the crowd, because they have been with me now three days and have nothing to eat, and if I send them away hungry to their homes, they will faint on the way, and some of them have come a long way." And his disciples answered him, "How can one feed these people with bread here in the desert?"
It was compassion that led Jesus to heal people's infirmities, to teach the multitudes and to feed them by multiplying the loaves and fishes. But Jesus gave his disciples the task of actually going out among the crowd and distributing the bread. Through them he fed the people with "bread here in the desert", and in this we can see a reflection of the role of the Christian educator as a disciple of Jesus. Bread symbolises the word of God, the source of true life. As disciples we are commissioned to feed the multitude with bread in the desert. We know what bread stands for. What does the desert symbolise for you today ?
As we look at the crowd of people in Lowry's painting, let us reflect on how Wisdom invites everyone to a come to a banquet of good food and fine wine. But how are they to come to the banquet? The compassion Jesus felt for ordinary people is reflected in the compassion that made Saint John-Baptist de La Salle take that first step towards the poor children of the cities of his day. That same compassion must be the starting point of our mission today as Christian Educators, our mission to ordinary people, to those we meet on the road and in the street, to young people who are hungry for the nourishment of an education, to those who have been metaphorically mugged along the road of life, to those who have become lost, to those who are in danger of spiritual death. Compassion will make us take that first step towards young people who are in such great need today
De La Salle was a man of great faith, prayer and compassion. But he was also a very down to earth, practical individual. In the Lasallian approach to things, Christian politeness is a concrete way of living out the Gospel values in every day life. De La Salle's approach to "civility", is in fact a spirituality, but is a spirituality that is very concrete and practical. For him, Christian spirituality is something to be embodied in ordinary actions. This is a very incarnational understanding of spirituality - a lay and secular spirituality of the busy city streets.