Love is the soul of education

Love is the Soul of Education

A child is blessed with human dignity ever since the moment of his or her conception. A child has the right to life and to a preventive education. To guide, to educate, and to develop a child’s intellect and soul is the fundamental human responsibility of parents.
Parents are their children’s first and main teachers, since there is an inalienable link between conceiving life and the responsibility to educate it. Therefore, a family has the vital duty to educate their children. Their role is essential, original, and primary to any other institution, thus, it is irreplaceable and inalienable; it cannot be usurped, nor proxied, nor delegated.
The main objective of a parent’s life mission should not be another one but to love their children, and, teach them how to love others. Love is the soul of education. The main objective and internal motor of education is love; in particular that one which comes from parents, the conceivers of life.
The education that is passed on from generation to generation represents the projection and continuation of conjugal love. One can never forget that teachers and instructors are just a parent’s collaborators and helpers. Parents have the main task to educate their children in and towards freedom.
Furthermore, a parent’s life mission, more than to transmit, consists of making love contagious to truth: the key to our soul’s peace and freedom. A correct education will build a responsible and preventive capacity to correctly use our human free will.
Parents are the main sources to give testimony of the value of life throughout their concrete existence along their children’s daily development. Once grown, children will thank their parents for the responsible education within freedom and love that they, as main guardians, have provided. Education is the best investment that parents can make for their children’s future, serving as a key towards happiness and awareness of life’s meaning.
On this note, the Declaration of Human Rights declares the vitality of our human responsibility for the development of a child’s education; a duty that should mainly be exercised by parents:
“The child, for the full and harmonious development of his personality, needs love and understanding. He shall, wherever possible, grow up in the care and under the responsibility of his parents, and, in any case, in an atmosphere of affection and of moral and material security” (Principle 6).
“The best interests of the child shall be the guiding principle of those responsible for his education and guidance; that responsibility lies in the first place with his parents” (Principle 7).
(Translated by Gianna A. Sanchez-Moretti)

Author and journalist Clemente Ferrer has led a distinguished career in Spain in the fields of publicity and press relations. He is currently President of the European Institute of Marketing.
clementeferrer3@gmail.com