Peruvian prelates pick up on the Pope’s words at Madrid’s World Youth Day: “You youngsters have the right to be given anchor points by the generations that precede you, in order for you to make choices and help you build your lives.”“Concentrate all your efforts into giving the family, with its fundamental educational role, the central role it once had and is due, in order to build a peaceful and ordered Country.”
This was the central passage in the appeal against violence, especially juvenile violence, which the President of the Episcopate and Archbishop of Trujillo, Héctor Miguel Cabrejos Vidarte addressed to institutions and the whole of Peruvian society.
The passage was quoted in the Holy See’s newspaper “L’Osservatore Romano.”
The violence, that has been taking place, particularly among youngsters, during sports competitions, has led the government to launch a stern awareness campaign. “Let us give up violence to avoid having to give up football”, is the slogan chosen for the initiative entrusted to two exceptional testimonies, two old stars of Peruvian football, Teófilo Cubillas and Oswaldo Ramírez.
Prelates took advantage of this climate to ask for broader reflection, pointing out, first of all, that that the people responsible for these acts of violence are not just isolated youngsters or misfits, one asks themselves what is going on in Peru’s society, within the family and in the Country’s institutions, especially in school and education sector.
“We recognise that our society has still not found efficient means with which to prevent, control and duly punish these acts.” Episodes of violence are becoming increasingly widespread and end up creating a climate of uncertainty. A real “culture of violence”, one of the main causes of which, is “the break-up of the family”, abuse and abandonment, which ends up in children being punished and often left to their own devices.
The situation is so bad, in fact, that even within educational structures, there has been an “alarming increase” in episodes of violence, molestation, physical and mental abuse, as well as an ever growing consumption of alcohol and drugs.
“We must not forget that education cannot just be all about academic performance and that through the education system, the State needs to assure families that their offspring will gain a solid education, along with moral and civil values that will allow them to grow and form part of a healthy society.”
Hence the appeal to state institutions, civil society and parents, to collaborate and increasingly join forces, in order to give the family back its deepest meaning, as “a fundamental institution of central importance in the advancement and development of individuals, society and therefore the Country.” And in order to guarantee that “our families become spaces for love, respect, dialogue, understanding and tolerance, in which children and young people can grow, surrounded by hope and optimism.”
In this context, Peruvian prelates recalled the words used by Benedict XVI during the World Youth Day that took place last August in Madrid.