Pope John Paul II addressed the World Union of Catholic Teachers, stating: “Unfortunately, in today’s world there are those who impose ‘silence’ on God and on all that refers to Him and even on any type of ‘discussion’ about the question at all; there exists a weak secularism that, while not expressly denying God and the sacred, put them between parentheses and exclude them from the living culture; there are currents of thought so absorbed in the fragments of ‘earthly things’ that they are incapable of inquiring into the meaning of man, of life, and the value of things themselves. Schools, and culture, must not let themselves be imprisoned in such a narrow and suffocating way. They must be open to all inquiry and questions regarding man, even the most profound, beginning with those that examine the meaning of life and death, the ultimate significance of existence, and the meaning of good and evil.”