B A C C A L A U R E A T E   2008

 

Invocation

 

The way the sweet Berkshire light falls on certain surfaces of architectural brick or mountain ridge–

            the way it tastes and smells and feels to walk certain paths you can see with your eyes closed

            the way certain voices sound as they tell you

what you need to hear, what you want to hear, what you don’t want to hear –

            the way any place can become a little vessel that fills up with memories

to the point of overflowing while you’re hardly even paying attention –

 

These are some of the things that do not change. 

You can count on them. 

They are as real and true as any real thing in the landscape of your life.

 

But other things are true, too.

 

Tomorrow, while we feast on all the grandeur and pageantry of accomplishments and accolades –

tomorrow, when we’re not looking, some things will be changing.

 

Even now, the tide of time is turning.

Even now, the wind that marks direction is beginning to shift.

Even now the landmarks by which you take your bearings are changing.

 

So we set aside this time for reaching inward – not to the summit so much as toward the center. 

Now, in the evening of your last full day of this adventure, comes the time to go deep –

to touch the things that do not change,

and to find in them the strength to greet wholeheartedly the things that are changing.

 

The poet prays the blessing of changing weather upon you:

 

may the tide

that is entering even now

the lip of our understanding

carry you out

beyond the face of fear

may you kiss

the wind then turn from it

certain that it will

love your back    may you

open your eyes to water

water waving forever

and may you in your innocence

sail through this to that *

 

So let us pause here, for almost the last time we will all be together,

with the pockets of every little crevice of familiar time and place

filling up to overflowing with memories –

and blessed once more in the company of one another –

 

Let us pause to pool such love and wisdom as these years and these people have instilled in us,

and lift them as our offerings of gratitude

in the Presence of the deepest love and the widest wisdom that the universe can contain.

 

Let us pause

to help each other believe that there is nothing to fear –

and, in believing, to find courage to look beyond the lip of our understanding –

and, in that looking, to kiss the changeable wind,

and instead of steering into the wind, as you’ve been trained and taught so diligently to do,

to turn and let it catch you under your wings as you spread them –

and in your soaring,

in the wisdom of all that you now know

and in the innocence of all that you don’t yet know,

to begin your journey from this to that.

 

To the Source of all wisdom and the destination of all hope and the reason for all love

let us open our hearts in grateful praise.

 

 

*

 

Prayers

 

So while we can still all do it together, let us breathe together the breath of life, in the presence of the Eternal source and destination of our lives, and savor that spirit of ripened heart, quieted mind, and deepened attention that many know by the name “prayer”.

 

O Living Mystery – the compassionate and merciful, ruler of the universe, creator, redeemer, sustainer, known by many names and comprehended by none –

 

We pause to count the blessings of this time and place – to wield our gratitude as a beacon to light the way from here.

 

For the awakening of mind and the urging of inspiration, we are grateful.  The surest sign of life in us is the urge to engage the unanswered question – and we rejoice in every faculty of our bodies, of this institution, and of the wisdom and learning of our forebears that has given us skill and courage enough to recognize, in each unfinished work and in every unresolved uncertainty, another opportunity to heal our world.

 

For the care of body and soul, for the gladdening of spirit, for the whetting of appetites, we are grateful.  The steadfast faith of parents and grandparents and even siblings has believed us back into being time and again.  The unheralded heroism of cooks and custodians, secretaries and security officers, groundskeepers and recordkeepers has surrounded us with comforts and amenities we have struggled not to take for granted, and made the work of living here seem easy even when it wasn’t.

 

And even for the stirring of conscience and even for the breaking of hearts, we are grateful.  In between other lessons, we have faced down, alone and together, the demons of self-doubt, the tearing of relationships, the unthinkable loss of friends.  We have strained to understand the costs of war, contemplated and calculated the fragility of the planet, and stood with each other against the outrages of prejudice and intolerance.  We have not weathered these struggles and pangs and even suffering easily, and would not wish them upon ourselves or our neighbors or our world.   But we have weathered them together – and we have grown stronger for the struggles that await us, strong enough to embrace even the uncertainty of the future, and to rise to it with as much knowledge and patience as we can find.

 

And for the still-unfinished work, the as-yet unanswered question, the lingering uncertainty about the shape of time to come, commitments still to be made, choices not yet resolved – even for these we are grateful.  For the wonder of life is still only just opening, like the pale green wave of spring as it ripples up the steep hillsides of the mountains.  The journey beckons, the summit awaits – and now we know, if we did not before, that the climb is, itself, the joy, and even the summit view is always provisional 

 

We are grateful for these gifts.  They inspired us, and humbled us; they have disclosed both our mistakes and our ability to forgive mistakes.  They have filled our hearts to overflowing, and opened our minds for entertaining fresh possibilities.  They have showed us how alive we are.

 

We offer this gratitude to you and to each other and to the creation itself – in the name of all that is sacred to each of us alone, and all that is holy to all of us together.

 

Amen.

 

 

*

 

Blessings

 

 

[Fr. Caster speaks.

Then Parvin speaks.

Then Bob sings the Three-fold Blessing:

            Gary  speaks the first internal line,

            Parvin speaks the second internal line,

            Rick speaks the final internal line.

 

Then, to conclude the service, Rick says:]

 

 

Namaste.  Vaya con Dios!  Pax vobiscum.  Salaam.  Shalom.  Go with God.