Our task in Fe y Alegría must be to awaken enthusiasm for the skill of learning. The desire to know, to understand, to grow, to create, to transform, to improve, to share, increases the value of learning. It is a way of being that is never satisfied with the accomplished, never put back by difficulties or limitations. It is a way of being, an attitude towards life that is learnt and practiced. Discipline is important for learning but even more so is motivation and desire.

We say that we live in a society of "knowledge". The speed and depth of changes are such that we have to live in continuous learning, in continuous novelty creation. We don't want to be only consumers of what has been created by others. Today development also means to learn and to innovate.

In Fe y Alegría we say that we learn in the length and width of life. That means that we don't look at our life as divided in phases and that we learn in one or several of them. Life is a process in which we learn since we are born until the day we die, not only in the school years but in the width of our life. To live is to learn continually.

Therefore the phases of life cannot be regarded as separate but as part of a process of the whole human life. The main subject is the person who learns and whose objective us to live fully. Each education phase is a moment of this process, so we therefore never stop learning, we are never alumni. We have to change the concept of ex-students for colleagues in a new phase of learning. Offer our learning services throughout life. Create learning communities in which we can participate or enter in all phases of our life.

Communities that will enable us to grow continually in the different dimensions of our lives together with other people.

Jorge Cela, S.J.
Federation General Coordinator