‘WHEN YOUR SON ASKS YOU’.... HOW REMEMBRANCE CAN TEACH LIFE-SATISFACTION

Jewish-christian tradition is memory-tradition. Just from the beginning, people are confronted with the God of Abraham, Isaak and Jacob and with particular situations, which are worth remembering (Exodus, Ten Commandments). Because the Bible combines remembering and teaching („When your son”... (Dtn 6, 20)), religious education means memory-education. Like Israel in real Exile and Diaspora, young pupils and students suffer from „virtual Exile or Diaspora“, when they are dwelling within their digital global village, and in „patchwork-families“, often without real home-experience and without any sense of belonging. Suffering from such experiences of missed orientation and belonging, they feel – as discussions in schools and groups underline - unsatisfied and uncomfortable, and look for authentic coping-models. Therefore, the study emphasizes – based on narrations of elder people - on a particular religious education-approach, which facilitates life-satisfaction by memory-learning from other experiences. The focus of research is on the question, whether memory-learning, combined with religious contents, rituals and/or metaphoric, could encourage life-satisfaction, and whether there are significant differences between East (Latvia) and West (Germany).