Eucharistic celebration and spiritual capital: the experience of students in a Spanish Catholic school – A research report inspired by the work of Dr Ann Casson, UK (2013)

The ‘Gospel’ according to Vygotsky? Reflections on the role of symbolic mediation in religious education

“…The theological understandings of symbolic mediation seem to include processes where humans interact actively with religious symbols. Such interactions are also empirically exemplified in studies referred to in the first part of the article where young Catholics describe their personal ritual experiences (Vestøl, 2016;Vide & Wroblewski, 2022). Moreover, some of the theologians also state that human existence has a symbolic dimension (Neacşu, 2021;Rahner, 1959Rahner, /1966.…”

“…Moreover, individual interpretations are also made visible in the empirical studies reported in the first part of the present article. While the theologians-despite differences in perspective-emphasise the importance of the religious symbols, some of the empirical studies show how for example Catholic students vary in their relation to ritual symbols (Casson, 2013;Vide & Wroblewski, 2022). The Norwegian study by Vestøl (2016) even report how Catholic students' understandings of ritual symbols are challenged by their classmates who challenge the religious understanding of symbols from secular materialist positions.…”