Spiritual Intelligence

Vivian R. Ferreira

Thinking about the responsibility of parents and educators in the solid, ethical, human, and, mainly, spiritual development of children, I recall on October 10, 1981, talking to Italian journalist Paulo Rappoccio Parisi (1921-2016), who for years had been living in Brazil. I argued for the utmost need to unite the wisdom that originates in the hearts of creatures with intellectual reasoning. Yes, because there is also the intelligence of feelings and emotions and, above all, the spiritual intelligence that comes from a World that is still invisible to our physical eyes, because of frequency issues, among other things. No one dies. We remain alive for Eternity.

Education with Ecumenical Spirituality

In the “Manifest of Good Will” (1991), I wrote about what the people themselves, followed by eminent thinkers, rightly declare by intuition: “While there is life there is hope.” The most correct path still lies in the area of Education with Ecumenical Spirituality, a step ahead in the Third Millennium that is approaching.

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However, the insensitivity of many was the motivation for this expressive challenge by the notable Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968): “One of the great tragedies of man’s long trek along the highway of history has been the limiting of neighborly concern to tribe, race, class, or nation.”

For this reason world efforts have to be destined for the rescue of the underprivileged portion of the planet, thus placing the values of society in their due order and directing the march of economic development in favor of humans, inasmuch as it is the living beings that generate progress, despite machines; if not, governments may not be governing for their people.

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Gandhi (1869-1948) used to say that “the measure of a civilization is how it treats its weakest members.” And there, in the indifference of many towards the rest, resides its weakness, if they do nothing to change the direction of the facts, for which it is equally necessary that they stop blaming God and His precepts for their mistakes. Therefore, this warning in the ancient aphorism of the Latin writer Publilius Syrus (85 B.C.-43 B.C.): “He who is shipwrecked twice is foolish to blame the sea.”

Merited Attention Towards Children

André Fernandes

So that this does not happen with our little ones who are preparing themselves for life, I was honored to inaugurate in São Paulo, Brazil, on January 25, 1986, the birth date of this colossal South American city, the Jesus Super Day Care Center, which belongs to a major Institute, today responsible for the daily education of 1,400 children, young people and adults.

Let us ponder on this teaching of Prophet Muhammad (570-632) — “May God’s peace and blessings be upon him!”—in the Holy Koran: “Children are the ornaments of life in this world.”

Jesus, in the Gospel according to Matthew 19:14, says about them: “Let the little children come to me; do not hinder them, because the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to them.” And Solomon in Proverbs 22:6 advises: “Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.”

William Luz

On announcing, also during the inauguration of the Jesus Super Day Care Center, the advent of the LGW’s Educational Institute, which would open on January 25, 1993, also in the city of São Paulo, I thus summed up its work philosophy: Here one studies—Brain and Heart are formed.