Challenges from Urban Cultures

The text provides a deep reflection on the city, analyzing its development throughout history up to the challenges and opportunities that contemporary cities must face, such as environmental sustainability and technological innovation. A significant aspect lies in the humanization of the city, highlighting the importance of human relationships and community participation in creating urban environments that respect the dignity and well-being of all citizens. The role of the Church and its relationship with the city is also discussed, exploring various approaches and challenges. Finally, the author proposes some guidelines for future-oriented urban planning, emphasizing the importance of citizen participation, integration between local and global, and cooperation.

The text carries out a rich and articulate exploration of the meaning and importance of certain terms in sacred texts by relating them to the contemporary urban condition. The linguistic approach reveals links between ancient terms and current concepts, emphasizing the importance of relationship and alliance in transforming urban spaces into places of identity and solidarity. The reflection converges toward a new humanism, based on mutual respect and integration, essential foundations for peace and urban coexistence. The concept of “perichoresis,” originally linked to Trinitarian theology, is extended to also include social relations and human communion within the city. The values identified are taken as milestones for new processes of urban regeneration and the creation of inclusive and sustainable communities.

The text reflects on Pope Francis’ vision of the city and its role in human and spiritual life. The Pope sees the city as a theological place, where God’s presence is revealed through the events of history and in the daily lives of people. The city is framed as a place of encounter, solidarity and fraternity, despite the challenges and contradictions it may present. The periphery becomes the true center of the city, the beating heart where the challenges and possibilities of building authentic bonds and promoting justice through a social and cultural covenant that respects and includes the different worldviews and lifestyles present in urban society are manifested.

The text explores the concept of a “theology of the city” through a historical and religious analysis that begins with a reflection on the foundational ambivalence of cities. The role of cities in biblical and Christian history is examined, highlighting how they have been both places of power but also spaces of hope and redemption. The paper examines the current challenges of contemporary cities and how these can be resolved by limiting the hegemony of supply and rediscovering a sense of community and sharing.

The text identifies an exit strategy from the current entropic crisis triggered by the pandemic through a reflection on the future of the city, understood as a place of human life and not as a mere space of economic and financial transactions. The need for a cultural paradigm shift is identified by focusing on the city as the place of human relations and community identity. The text explores the history of Italian cities and their role in the construction of civilization by recalling the importance of an integrated approach that combines urban planning, ecology, and citizen participation to realize a vision of the city that is sustainable, inclusive, and able to adapt to future challenges.

The text explores the concept of spirituality in urban spaces, analyzing how ethics can guide the design and transformation of cities through a balance between two ethical approaches: one based on the regulation of actions (related to law and norm), and the other centered on the search for meaning and the “good life” (oriented toward purpose and values). The idea of spirituality of places is examined broadly, without being limited to a religious connotation. Spirituality is seen as giving meaning to urban spaces through three main aspects: Memory, community and critical wisdom.

The text analyzes the relationship between worship, city and culture by emphasizing the importance of Christian liturgy in the construction of urban society, highlighting how it has historically contributed to the conformation of cities and civilization. Indeed, liturgy is presented as an experience that interconnects worship, city and culture, generating new opportunities for coexistence and dialogue among people. The author also analyzes the complexity of contemporary cities and proposes the idea that liturgy and liturgical planning can provide spaces for gathering in an urban context characterized by new cultural and social challenges. The importance of the parish as an ecclesial institution capable of adaptation and innovation is discussed, with the aim of imagining new spatialities and ways to foster inclusion and communion.

The text explores the complexity of urban experience through an anthropological lens and the connection between urban space and spirituality. The author starts from his epistemological positioning and analyzes the relationship between contemporary cities and evangelical principles, drawing on the text “Evangelii Gaudium” (EG). The text highlights how the modern and post-modern city is characterized by a number of contradictions, such as anonymity and mobility, which offer challenges but also opportunities to build bonds and meaningful places. The author points out how urbanization and marginalization of urban areas are the result of political and economic processes, which create places of exclusion and socioeconomic exploitation. However, these same marginal areas can become spaces of revelation, where divine presence can be discovered and social justice can be promoted. The anthropological approach suggests a way of inhabiting the world that focuses on listening, respecting and understanding subjects and their connections to space. The text calls for a new form of urban design that recognizes and values the ability of inhabitants to transform space through ties and relationships. These ties, based on values of solidarity, justice and mutual recognition, can help create more humane and inclusive urban spaces.

The text explores the complexity of “periphery” in its multiple meanings and interpretations through a reflection on the possibility of conceiving the periphery as central, a boundary place that holds the complexity of human experience and offers opportunities for innovation and creativity. Starting from the Greek etymological meaning of the word, the text suggests other meanings, such as circular movement, wandering, recovering and resisting. The periphery, as a boundary site, can be a laboratory for learning to deal with conflict creatively, to explore the complexity of relating to the other, and to recognize the value of limits. This approach recognizes that conflict is not necessarily violence but can be an opportunity to create new spaces for dialogue and understanding.

The text explores the centrality of the peripheries in the thinking of Pope Francis, who sees them as privileged vantage points for understanding the world and the Church. In “Evangelii gaudium,” Francis argues that the peripheries are places of inclusion and new evangelization, recalling the image of the New Jerusalem as a model of a just and welcoming city. Architects and urban planners are called to think of spaces that foster integration and recognition of the other. The suburbs become a laboratory for creativity and innovation, where new forms of solidarity and connection can be built. The text reflects on the fragilities and enormous potential of peripheries, beings that have just been born but can become the ideal place where a more just society can be built.

The text carries out a reflection on the content of the interventions that make up the publication by focusing on three key concepts (Heritage, Community and Nature) in support of a commitment to sustainability that is reaffirmed by the other texts? The author reflects on the disillusionment of the present compared with the hopes and passions of the past. He also explores the ideas of faith, trust and hope, reflecting on how these concepts are linked to engagement with the world and collective responsibility. The focus is on the need to strengthen today’s civitas in order to build the shared spaces of tomorrow's urbs through an architecture of dialogue that requires relationships and connections between places and people.

The text analyzes the role of cities as epicenters of new cultures and how they respond to the challenges of diversity and cultural hybridization starting with the words of Pope Francis in his Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium. The text explores the pope's vision of architecture and urban space, considered as reflections of political dynamics and social interactions. The document also emphasizes the importance of spirituality in the urban environment, arguing how it can emerge anywhere, not just in spaces traditionally dedicated to worship, and questioning traditional conceptions of spirituality related to religious spaces, proposing a more inclusive perspective that also involves communities and social action. The text suggests a more inclusive and interdisciplinary approach to urban design that is capable of fostering communities by rethinking disciplinary boundaries and creating new design methods that integrate social, cultural and economic thinking.