Jesuit education carries with it many implications on both the academic world it revolves in and the real world in which it places so much emphasis on. This is due to the intricate focus on justice and educating for justice throughout jesuit education practices. However, it is interesting to consider what exactly the implications that this intense and thorough focus on justice in Jesuit education are. These implications can perhaps be narrowed into the central concepts of having an openness towards innovation through learning and thinking with open and compassionate minds and having a higher level of education which stems from the jesuit idea of providing and receiving an education for a higher purpose, as well as with great purpose.
Having an openness towards innovation while learning through the process of jesuit education is crucial due to the core of the teaching style and principles behind jesuit education, all of which encourage open thinking and breaking apart barriers, both mentally and philosophically which were developed prior to receiving a jesuit education. Learning with an open mind is crucial as these barriers are being broken because without an open mind, one cannot fight for the justice of others as they learn about injustices that were unknown to the student prior to the lesson. Without an open mind and an openness towards an innovative way of thinking, it is impossible to appreciate or consider the justice or equality of all those in a community, both locally or globally. Father Arrupe addressed the importance of having an openness towards innovative thinking in “Men for Others” where he discusses and advocated why educating for justice is a crucial component of jesuit education in the modern world due to issues that modern-day people face in their lives and in their communities. He writes,
But it could not have been a complete failure if we were able to pass on to you this spirit of openness to new challenges, this readiness for change, this willingness - putting it in Scriptural terms - to undergo conversion. This is our hope… (Arrupe 4).
In this quotation is extremely evident that Arrupe is speaking of the importance of an open mind and a willingness for innovation in one’s way of thinking when learning justice and becoming men for and with others. This is very much true even to this day, as without an open mind and an openness towards innovative thinking, intolerance is not only born, but is able to flourish and thrive happily.
A second implication of jesuit education which stems from an intense and thorough focus on this idea of justice, particularly within the frame of educating for justice, is that of a higher level of education. Jesuit institutions are often known as prestigious thinking institutions and are well renowned, but could this be due to their strong focus and interest on justice and educating a people for justice? A focus on justice in an academic environment tends to grow a community of higher education because the education itself is for a higher purpose. That higher purpose is to both serve the real world, as well as the individual. This is an important concept because without such an idea, higher education would not be correlated with jesuit education, which is often a high appeal factor of it. John Sobrino addresses the concerns of the importance of education for a higher purpose in Awakening from the Sleep of Inhumanity as he discusses the flaws of human kind and therefore the strong need for purpose as well as success to keep us motivated and emotionally stable. He writes, “‘And the Lord was sorry that he had made humankind on earth, and it grieved him to his heart.’ To put this in even more anthropological terms, we do not know how it is possible to be a human being and not sometimes feel the shame of belonging to inhuman humanity” (Sobrino 6). Due to the nature of humans discussed by Sobrino in this quotation, one can understand both how there will always be injustice that will need to be addressed and confronted with justice that one can only learn through proper education of justice and also how humans will always need a sense of accomplishment or success due to their prior issues with such topics, and therefor the education for justice and action with justice will allow for satisfaction of these troubles.
Through the service that comes from serving justice one can not only learn about others in their community both locally and globally as a whole or about the world itself and expand one’s scope of knowledge about the world and all it has to offer, but also about oneself. Through service of others, especially service of others that involves the commitment to justice, can strengthen and educate oneself about themselves and parts of themselves they would have never known otherwise. Therefore, in conclusion, it is evident that education for justice is crucial to many implications as well as developments in education in the modern world.
