The Ideas of Constantine the Philosopher - St. Cyril. Inspiration for Educational Social Work

The Ideas of Constantine the Philosopher - St. Cyril. Inspiration for Educational social Work. Introduction The inspiration for our reflection on the transcendence of the ideas of Constantine - St. Cyril and their influence on our author's concept of Educational Social Work is, for us, the historical poetic composition PROGLAS. This work is a precious spiritual and cultural heritage that the brothers and evangelisers Constantine - St. Cyril and St. Methodius gave to the Slovak nation, for the reason that: "writing becomes an irreplaceable means of the spiritual growth of the individual and of the whole community. For, as Constantine - St. Cyril says: No soul without letters has awareness of that Law of God, the Law of the book, or the spiritual Law, the Law through which the Paradise of God is revealed." (Cyril Vasiľ, In: Proglas – Konštantín Filozof, sv.Cyril, 2013, s.10, s.12.) With all humility, we will attempt to indicate the significance of some of the ideas of Constantine the Philosopher - St. Cyril for our author's concept of educational social work. 1 Educational Social Work "When Saint Cyril (Constantine the Philosopher) and Methodius brought the Old Church Slavonic script to Great Moravia and gave our ancestors a translation of the Old and New Testament, they knew what a treasure they were giving us. Today we are overwhelmed by thousands of books, many of which are worthless, without an enlivening idea, or offer only blades of grass and pale traces of wisdom. Centuries ago, people revered one book above all the treasures of the world. They called it the Book – the Bible. In it they found the concentrated wisdom of life. They revered a book that was strong and sparkling with the depth of its ideas, unique in all of world literature, which shaped the life of nations and their culture." (Ján Chryzostom kardinál Korec.) We defined and published the concept of Educational Social Work in two author's monographs: Preventívna sociálna práca – Edukačná paradigma v sociálnej práci (2013) and Edukačná sociálna práca (2014), and also in several scientific studies. Educational Social Work is a concept and a practical activity aimed at social change in the lives of adult persons through inducing their psychological change. Through social education and educational social counselling, social clients are led towards the development of their own psychological potential. With the aim that they become spiritually, psychologically, and socially mature human beings. In the poetic work Proglas, a timeless philosophy of the human being is presented, according to Constantine the Philosopher. His creative legacy is relevant to this day and can be a "compass" also in defining the higher mission of the theory and practice of social work. In today's reality of life, it is necessary to lead adult people towards responsibility for their own lives. Figuratively speaking, people need to be taught how to "grow bread, not only to consume it." Educational Social Work is being formed as a new kind of social work. Its task is to motivate and, through education (upbringing and teaching), to support adult people - social clients - towards a change in their behaviour and conduct in the case of a socially burdensome situation and social problems. A positive change in the assessment of the social situation and the decision to act differently also influences the constructive way of solving a social problem. Clients bear personal responsibility for whether they become a spiritually, psychologically, and socially mature personality. People need to be motivated to activity and supported in changing their dysfunctional way of behaviour and conduct in their family, working, and civic life. "In Proglas, Constantine's philosophy of the human being is summarised. In this view, the human being comprehends the Word and, from it, lives as an intelligent being, nourishes his soul with it, strengthens his heart with this Word, and recognises God as the foundation and the wellspring of the world and of his life. The human being must acquire a knowledge of letters in order to rise, through book culture, to the Law of God – to the life of the spirit….It is truly necessary today to emphasise that the invention of the Old Church Slavonic script was not merely a general cultural act. It was a spiritual and expressly Christian act. Into Old Church Slavonic there was translated, first and foremost, the Holy Scripture and the liturgical books. …And it was only in connection with faith that the first literary-artistic work also came into being, the beautiful poem Proglas. The new alphabet was to stand, first and foremost, in the service of faith and of Christian life." (Ján Chryzostom kardinál Korec.) 2 Becoming a psychologically, spiritually, and socially mature human being "All you who wish to behold your souls in beauty, and all you who long for joy, who long to drive away the darkness, the sinful darkness, forever and to rid yourselves of the rottenness of this world, and to discover for yourselves the paradisal life anew, and to escape forever the burning fire, hear now what your own mind tells you, hear, all of you, the whole Slovene nation, hear the Word, sent down to you from God, the Word that will feed the hungry human souls, the Word that will strengthen both your mind and your heart, the Word that will prepare you to come to know God." (Konštantín Filozof, Proglas, 2013, s. 23 - 25.) Every age has its mission and task, which the Chinese already respected in ancient times, when they divided a person's life into the period of youth (up to 20 years), the period of founding a family (from 20 to 30 years), the period of recognising one's own mistakes (from 30 to 50 years), the last period of creative life (from 50 to 60 years), and from 60 to 70 years was for them the age they wished to reach. "Human individuality is not only unique and unrepeatable, but its development also proceeds along a unique curve...a being develops that is always the same and yet constantly different, in which the structural function of today contains not only the past layering, but also the contradictory components of the activity-forms of tomorrow. Here we understand development as the constant balancing of contradictory tendencies, as a complex struggle of movement and rest, of inner growth and external influence, of expansion and disintegration, of unique formation and general progression, of necessities and chances, of causes and purpose, of enlargement and qualitative changes." (V. Příhoda, 1967, s. 42-43.) In the periodisation of a person's life, chronological age is most often used as a sorting criterion, in combination with a more or less specific definition of life developmental tasks. 3. Life stages and tasks of adults (according to some significant representatives of lifelong developmental psychology) The overview was compiled by: T. Pardel and A. Hrabovská (In: J. Koščo a kol., 1987, s. 58 - 59.) CH. Bühlerová: Period - (25 - 45 yrs) / Developmental tasks - Maturity, life tasks. Period - (45 - 65 yrs) / Developmental tasks - Psychological and social development, success. Period - (65 yrs + ) / Developmental tasks - Spiritual relationship to life. D. E. Super: Period - (25 - 45 yrs) / Building a family and a career in the private and professional sphere. Period - (45 - 65 yrs) / Maintaining one's position and stabilisation in life. Period - (65 - 70 yrs) / Slowing down of work, family, and leisure activities. Period - (70 yrs + ) / Decline of life activities, retirement age. D. B. Bromley: Period - (20 - 25 yrs) / Early adulthood. Period - (25 - 40 yrs) / Middle adulthood. Period - (40 - 55 yrs) / Late adulthood. Period - (55 - 65 yrs) / Before retirement. Period - (65 - 70 yrs) / Retirement. Period - (75 yrs + ) / Old age. V. Příhoda Period - (30 - 40 yrs) / Stabilisation. Period - (45 - 60 yrs) / Involution. Period - (60 - 75 yrs) / Senium. Period - (75 yrs + ) / Great old age. D. J. Levinson - Period - (22 - 40 yrs) / Early adulthood. Period - (22 - 28 yrs) / Entry into the world of adults. Period - (28 - 33 yrs) / Transition through the thirties. Period - (33 - 40 yrs) / Settling down. Period - (40 - 45 yrs) / Transitional phase, transit into middle age. - Period - (45 - 65 yrs) / Middle adulthood. Period - (45 - 50 yrs) / Entry into middle adulthood. Period - (55 - 60 yrs) / Culmination of middle age. Period - (60 - 65 yrs) / Transitional phase, transit into late adulthood. - Period - (65 yrs + ) / Late adulthood. The transitional phases, named as transits of the life journey, are sensitive life periods in which important developmental changes occur in individual persons. 4. Tasks of human development in adulthood A synthesis of the biological, psychological, and social aspects of periodisation, that is, of the division of a person's life into distinct periods, is represented by the approach of R. J. Havighurst. We present his definition of life periods (In: J. Koščo 1987, s. 62) because it specifically describes the life developmental tasks in adulthood, which are at the centre of our interest. He divides adulthood into three periods, for which certain developmental tasks are characteristic (we have called them developmental tasks): The developmental tasks of early adulthood (18 - 30 years): to choose a partner; to learn to live together with a partner; to found a family; to raise children; to run a household; to enter employment; to assume civic responsibility; to seek a kindred social group. The developmental tasks of middle age (30 - 60 years): to provide models of value orientation for one's children; to assume social responsibility and to become engaged; to achieve results in the professional sphere; to accept one's own bodily changes and to adapt to the process of ageing; to take over responsibility for ageing parents. The developmental tasks of late adulthood (without a specified age): to adapt to the dwindling of energy and bodily strength; to adapt to retirement age and to the reduction of financial income; to come to terms with the death of a partner; to create relationships of age kinship, with a group of peers; to take on new social roles flexibly; to secure adequate and satisfactory housing. In defining the developmental tasks of the individual, we will mention the psychosocial theory of development of E. H. Erikson (1959): "Within various crises it becomes apparent that every quality of the Ego (the I) appears as a response to an inner fundamental plan as well as to the social environment, and is formed in confrontation with various demands of the surroundings. By a crisis, E. H. Erikson understands a turning point, that is, a time when the potential as well as the vulnerability of the person greatly increases." (In: C. Hall – G. Lindzey, 1997, s. 67 – 68.) The Ego (the I) has creative qualities, strives to adapt actively to the environment, and finds creative solutions to every new problem. "Even in the face of failures it responds actively, because it is fundamentally strong and flexible." (Ibid.) 5. The legacy of Constantine - St. Cyril and the human path to maturity Let us repeat the significant legacy of Constantine - St. Cyril to the Slovak nation: "...hear now what your own mind tells you, hear, all of you, the whole Slovene nation, hear the Word, sent down to you from God, the Word that will feed the hungry human souls, the Word that will strengthen both your mind and your heart. the Word that will prepare you to come to know God. Just as joy will not dawn without light, so that the sight might behold all of God's creation, for not everything is beautiful nor discernible"... These words too follow on from the message of the precious work Proglas: "If today the lay world speaks of an insurmountable abyss between faith... and science on the other side, that is, of a seemingly insurmountable conflict between fides and ratio, St. Cyril, on the contrary, saw in science, above all in the kind of cognition that leads the soul to wisdom, the realisation of God's plan for the human being. This call for harmony between reason and faith is already contained in Proglas, which does not set them in opposition, but calls them to mutual service." (Cyril Vasiľ, Proglas, 2013, s .12.) "For Constantine - St. Cyril, true science and genuine wisdom were represented by philosophy, which he defined as: "the knowledge of divine and human things, insofar as a person can draw near to God, (since philosophy) teaches a person that by his deeds he is to become the image and likeness of the one who created him." (Cyril Vasiľ, Proglas, 2013, s. 12.) Writing, as the bearer of the message of the Word, thus becomes an irreplaceable means of the spiritual growth of the individual and of the whole community. For, as Constantine - St. Cyril says: "no soul without letters has awareness of that Law of God, the Law of the book, that is, the spiritual Law... And even more than stone, the letterless soul appears lifeless within a person." (Ibid., s. 26.) We will build on the previous messages and present facts connected with the life tasks of persons in adulthood, which are important for the development of their psychological and spiritual maturity. We were inspired by the ideas of the psychologist E. H. Erikson, who defined the life tasks of the development of the adult person's personality as follows (In: C. Hall – G. Lindzey, 1997, s. 71): Adulthood (30 - 65): For this life period, the individual's motivation to join his own personal identity with the identity of other persons is important, because this helps to form his own personality. An unsteady and undefined identity of the individual causes his relationships to other people to be detached and emotionally labile, by which he isolates himself psychologically and socially. Mutual deep affection in the relationships one experiences is important for a person's life. Mature age (65 + ): For this life period, the individual's need to create ideas, to maintain relationships, to manage situations, to create objects, to apply his abilities and creativity is important. If this is not the case, a person risks being psychologically impoverished in many ways and, as a person, stagnating. In mature age it is important that older people cultivate, within their possibilities, everything they have created in life. And also that they have a positive influence on their offspring. A retrospective view of one's life, accompanied by satisfaction that life had its meaning and order, leads to the integrity of the particular person. And conversely, doubts about oneself and one's life, unfulfilled needs, expectations, and life plans lead to dissatisfaction, even to despair. It is a well-known truth that life wisdom in old age lies in the preservation and passing on of the knowledge and experience of the given person, accumulated over the years, to the next generation of people. The profiling of the specific developmental tasks of adult persons, which in our texts we have called developmental tasks (M. Machalová 2013, 2014 and elsewhere), continues today at a more pronounced pace than was the case in the past. Further and new, previously unknown developmental tasks of adulthood are appearing, for example:

• To develop one's own capacity to learn, to educate oneself in adulthood and in old age as well.
• To learn to use new information and communication means.
• To learn new ways of maintaining one's health.
• To adapt to the new hierarchy of people's values and interests, and to the difference and diversity of the lifestyle of people today.
• To be able to adapt psychologically and socially, even in conditions of social and psychological discrimination, of social and health disadvantage of adult persons in society, including people of senior age and in old age.
• To be able to understand what is overt and what is covert manipulation of people's consciousness and subconscious. To learn to recognise and to be critical of the psychological pressure of the mass media, of mindless entertainment, of practices that demean human dignity, and of the trivialisation of the absolute value for a human being, which is his life.

Life tasks and the tendency of development of the human personality Let us begin with words from the work of Constantine the Philosopher - St. Cyril. (Proglas , 2013, s. 32 - 34): "...when the body does not have its proper nourishment: in just the same way every soul declines in life, when it lives without the life of God, when it hears nowhere the word of God. Yet let us tell another, most wise parable, people who love one another together, longing to grow with God's growth from now on! For who would not know this simple truth? Just as a seed that has fallen into fertile soil, in the same way all human hearts on earth need for themselves the rain of God's letters, so that the fruit of God may grow in them as much as possible. Who can tell all the parables that accuse and convict a tongue without books, that it does not speak with an intelligible voice? The education (upbringing and teaching) of adults, as a way of attaining education and of developing people's personal competences, is at every age inseparably connected with people's life developmental, or developmental, tasks. Developmental changes are not the privilege of childhood and adolescence, but occur equally in a person's adult and senior age. In various life stages, developmental changes are brought about by various social and psychological causes that are also specific to the given age. An important role in this is played by people's upbringing and self-upbringing, their education and self-education, through which people learn throughout their lives. The life tasks of individual persons are unique. D. Boadella (1996) arrived at the finding that the process of development of the human personality is directed:

• towards the self-organisation of the person, which is a manifestation of the human being's evolutionary drive towards psychological development;
• towards the self-regulation (governance) of the person, which is a manifestation of the attainment of psychological integrity and of the balance of the psyche, behaviour, and conduct of the human being.

The mentioned tendencies manifest, in the development of a particular human person, in his own unique way of experiencing, behaving, and acting. A human being possesses inherited and innate dispositions for survival. And under adequate life conditions he develops spiritually, psychologically, socially, and physically, as a unique holistic human being. The advancement of a particular person towards psychological adulthood (maturity) is realised in that he learns throughout his life. He learns consciously and unconsciously, through upbringing (self-upbringing) and education (self-education). He becomes a psychologically adult (mature) personality, behaves and acts as a mature personality. The well-known wisdom holds that a tree can be known by its fruit. We will only add that the maturity or immaturity of a person's personality can be known by his behaviour, that is, his self-manifestation, and by his conduct, that is, his deeds. Instead of a conclusion "If today the world speaks of an insurmountable abyss between faith and religion on the one side, and reason or science on the other side, that is, of a seemingly insurmountable conflict between fides et ratio, St. Cyril, on the contrary, saw in science, above all in the kind of cognition that leads the soul to wisdom, the realisation of God's plan for the human being. The call for harmony between reason and faith is contained in Proglas, which does not set them in opposition, but calls them to mutual service. This message of his is valid also today". (Cyril Vasiľ, 2013, s. 12.) Author: Prof. PhDr. Mária Machalová, CSc. References BOADELLA, D.1996. Soma, Jáství a Prapůvod. In: Energie & Charakter. Vědecký časopis. Roč.1, č.1, s.8-26. CYRIL Vasiľ. 2013. I Slovo i Písmo. In: Konštantín Filozof – Sv.Cyril: Proglas. Slovenská národná knižnica. Martin, s. 9-17. HALL,C. - LINDZEY,G. 1997. Psychológia osobnosti. Bratislava: Slovenské pedagogické nakladateľstvo. 510 s. ISBN80-08-00994-4. KONŠTANTÍN FILOZOF - Sv.CYRIL. 2013. Proglas. Slovenská národná knižnica. Martin, ISBN 978-80-8149-012-5. KOŠČO, J. a kol. 1987. Poradenská psychológia. Bratislava: Slovenské pedagogické nakladateľstvo. 446 s. MACHALOVÁ,M. 2013. Preventívna sociálna práca – Edukačná paradigma v sociálnej práci. Prešov: Prešovská univerzita. 272 s. ISBN 978-80-555-0932-7. MACHALOVÁ,M. 2014. Edukačná sociálna práca. Prešov: Prešovská univerzita. 327 s. ISBN 978-80-555-1118-4. PŘÍHODA,V. 1967. Ontogeneze lidské psychiky I-IV. Praha, SPN.