We publish selected excerpts from the introduction to Antoine Arjakovsky’s work Crossed Perspectives on the History of European Consciousness. Antoine Arjakovsky is a French historian and theologian, professor, and Doctor of Historical Sciences. From 2004 to 2011, he served as director of the Institute of Ecumenical Studies at the Ukrainian Catholic University.
- A shared awareness is emerging in Europe of the belonging of all Europeans to a single political and civilizational formation. However, Europeans still lack a unified historiography and a common narrative of this shared consciousness. There are many reasons for this — political, philosophical, and historical.
- The Bernardine College project, in cooperation with the Federation of Catholic Universities of Europe, the Catholic University of Leuven, the University of Luxembourg, the Maison de l’Europe in Paris, and the European Cultural Foundation, is based on an original methodology. It aims to present a history of crossed perspectives (regards croisés) on European consciousness.
- The first objective of this history of consciousness is to discover, beyond linguistic experience, the threads that invisibly connect knowledge and conscience — science and conscience. Reconciliation between the Renaissance era and our present time, between science as wisdom and science as technique, is essential for contemporary Europe.
- According to Herman Van Rompuy, the basis of such reconciliation between science and conscience is love. Yet love, by definition, cannot be imposed. Love, as the foundation of European values and as the basis of a new common economy, can only manifest itself as a gift from each individual.
- A new narrative of European consciousness must be grounded, as philosopher Paul Ricoeur suggested, in a new personalist anthropology developed in the 1930s in several major European capitals. This implies translation of discourses, intersecting narratives, and mutual requests for forgiveness.
Historical memory is no longer formed in an egocentric or nationalist manner, inclined to justify itself and conceal what wounds national narcissism. Instead, it requires recognition of oneself in the other, openness to other cultures, and the emergence of a shared historical memory and a common social culture based on civility, legality, and publicity.
Jean-Marc Ferry