Dedicated to intergenerational dialogue and the value of the life experience of older people for youth education, this Thursday's speakers included the promoter of the Jacobean Holy Year and the 19-year-old influencer Roque Star.
This Friday, among others, former Attorney General Julián Sánchez Melgar and the son of drug trafficker and narcoterrorist Pablo Escobar will speak.
The Pancho Guerra Cultural Center, in Tunte, hosted this Thursday the beginning of the V Days of training, reflection and experiential awareness of the 'Path of Values' project, organized by the #UP2U Association with the aim of instilling values and social skills in young people in situations of social vulnerability or at risk of suffering it and with judicial measures.
Dedicated in this edition to intergenerational dialogue and the fundamental role played by older people as transmitters of essential values such as effort, respect or perseverance, among others, the conference was opened by the promoter and president of the #UP2U Association, the magistrate of the Juvenile Court No. 1 of Las Palmas, Reyes Martel Rodríguez, and the deputy mayor and councilor of Presidency, Culture, Education and Youth, Elena Álamo Vega, accompanied at the table by Daniel Lorenzo, director of the Cathedral Foundation of Santiago de Compostela, and by the professor of Philosophy of the University of Santiago de Compostela (USC) and president of the Xacobean Academy, Marcelino Agis Villaverde.
Mayor Marco Aurelio Pérez Sánchez highlighted the importance of these Values Path Days and the #UP2U solidarity and integration project, emphasizing their focus on young people as a fundamental part of society, and especially their support for young people who have faced challenges in their lives. “This is the key to these days, which are raising the bar each year with the speakers participating, and which are allowing the Reyes Martel and San Bartolomé de Tirajana project to become a benchmark for reintegration into society,” he stated.
Under the slogan 'Legacy and Education', Thursday morning's session was structured around three presentations. Víctor Vázquez Portomeñe, one of the architects of Galicia's Statute of Autonomy, promoter of the network of cultural centers in that Autonomous Community, the main driving force behind the celebration of the Holy Year of St. James (1993), and defender of the Law for the Protection of the Ways of St. James (1996), was the first speaker, participating via videoconference. She focused her speech on explaining the historical, cultural, and social evolution of the Camino de Santiago and its significance for Western civilization. She also detailed how, in 1992, with a group of collaborators sitting in a tavern in Santiago, she conceived the idea, with initial notes scribbled on napkins, of the institutionalization of the Holy Year of St. James in Galicia, which was finally approved unanimously by parliamentary political support in 1993. “Reyes Martel has earned our esteem. The Camino de los Valores (Way of Values) encompasses one of the most sensitive aspects of the Camino de Santiago, namely its redemptive and re-educative potential, which she uses with exemplary affection and intelligence with the minors in her care,” she said.
The second presentation was given by the President of the Madrid School Council, Pilar Ponce Velasco, who, after explaining how the organization works and what actions it carries out, focused her speech on the projects launched to incorporate the wisdom and experience of grandparents into the classrooms after it was detected that socially they are replacing many fathers and mothers in the care and education of children.
The third presentation was given by Marcial Morales Martín, former mayor of Puerto del Rosario and president of the Fuerteventura Island Council and current vice president of the Yrichen Canary Foundation. He explained the important role that older people play as guides and a buffer against youth addictions, and in the projects that Yrichen is developing in the field of addictions and their prevention, including volunteering that allows for intergenerational relationships for the exchange of values and guidance on the paths of loneliness.
After a break for lunch, the afternoon session dedicated to "Reality Shock" featured the young influencer Roque Iglesias (Roque Star), who at just 19 years old has become one of the leading social motivators with his motto "always a positive attitude." He gave a direct talk about his experience and how "the resilience of our elders is the best life tutorial for today's youth." The speaker was born prematurely in 2007 with cerebral palsy and cardiorespiratory problems, blind, and with only 20% of his brain functioning. After more than 50 surgeries, he learned to speak, regained his sight, walks with assistance, and has decided "never to give up and to live life with enthusiasm and without excuses." In his talks, he proclaims that "we all have something that makes us unique," and he champions humor as a life tool. He shares his experience to inspire others to take on their own challenges. His time in hospitals awakened in him the power of effort, patience, and a positive attitude. She argues that her life is not a reflection of what she was, but of what she has chosen to be. “We must learn to put problems into perspective. We all have problems, but the key is how we face them, our attitude. This must always be positive,” she stated.
Protection, forgiveness, survival, and hospitality
For the session this Friday the 15th, the "Path of Values" conference has scheduled four more presentations between 10:00 AM and 15:00 PM. The first will be given by Judge and former Attorney General Julián Sánchez Melgar, who will address the legal protection of vulnerability and the ethical commitment of young people as custodians of the dignity of their elders. The second, in the form of a panel discussion entitled "Forgiveness That Liberates," will be led by writer and architect Sebastián Marroquín Santos (Juan Pablo Escobar Henao), who will draw on his personal experience. The son of the infamous Colombian drug trafficker and terrorist Pablo Escobar, after reflecting on his father's misguided life path, has decided to offer the world, and especially young people, lessons of peace and reconciliation for building a future free from the burdens of the past. He anticipated that his presentation will focus on his own life choices ("because it is our own decisions that lead us down one path or another, and that bring us certain consequences"). He maintains that the path of his father, Pablo Escobar, “is not one we should follow as human beings.” After reflecting on him and his associates, he says, “I have seen that no one has ever truly succeeded in a life of crime, and that there is no such thing as success in a life of crime.”
The third lecture will be given by Marcelino Agís Villaverde, Professor of Philosophy and Anthropology at the University of Santiago de Compostela and one of Galicia's most internationally renowned academic thinkers, who will speak on the ethics of care and the role of caregivers. The closing address, on hospitality as destiny and the value of embracing old age as the noblest goal of the human journey, will be delivered by Daniel Lorenzo Santos, Director of the Santiago Cathedral Foundation.
