Issue Home Volume 11: Issue 4

Teaching the Whole Person
JJ Mueller, S.J.
Theological Studies

“Teaching the whole person” cannot be cliché in Jesuit pedagogy, especially when it pertains to a unique person becoming a whole human being, enabled by personal gifts to live life the best one can, and be transformed by life unfolding in the context of all humanity and creation. Far from knowledge being an end in itself, it is preciously necessary as a means to an end—to transform us to be the best human beings for ourselves and for others. Knowledge, then, lives and breathes in a wider context and process: it begins in our experiences of all kinds and types; then moves to the act of understanding which examines and sifts those experiences; then our judgment weighs what is true and false, and then we must move to decisions: i.e. to act based on what is true or false. Here is where our morality of good and bad, right or wrong, love or hate enters into our action and either humanizes or dehumanizes the person and others. In the final analysis, knowledge, precious as it is, serves our humanization.

To take one example, Jesuit education, therefore, cannot stop with giving the best information/knowledge on a topic and be satisfied. It has to be more. A student must learn to make judgments about truth along the way—such as why is this true? What are reasons? What about the context? What am I missing? How do I apply it concretely? Then the student must learn by putting the judgment made--its veracity--into practice by action and then examine how that knowledge plays out in lived life. The dynamic action from experience to the act of understanding, to judgment, to action (experience) is a process we engage in our whole life long. Here is where knowledge touches lives, leaders are formed, and students become women and men for others.

Therefore, I believe a Jesuit education should hone the skills of every step of the act of understanding. No stage can be neglected. The whole must be attended to. I believe teaching is ultimately an act of liberation for students and a holy act of empowering them to find themselves in relation to our world and God. I must remind myself and the students that only they can make it happen.

Last updated 04.28.09