Commencement Invocation by Cam Hardy
I join my colleagues in welcoming all of you, Gov. Weld, and the family and friends of the great class of 2008. I am so honored to be giving the invocation today. As both mom and college counselor to a cross section of this class, I have gotten to know them in new and different ways than I have other classes. It’s been fun and a real privilege. And I have to say that you are a great group of families, given the children you have brought to us. This class is diverse, at times divergent, but amicably so; you are caring, self-sacrificing, creative, impassioned and pro active about a host of issues; but what I think brings you together is your spiritedness, your ability to still play—to go jump in the creek or the ponds in October, and to show up at the Student Center on a random school night wearing your Wolverine costume, to shovel off the zoo pond for an impromptu skating party. At a time in our world when so much is difficult, and blatantly wrong, I have no trouble envisioning many of you on the ground, persisting with causes, but also in your spiritedness imbuing whatever you do with optimism. This is a most precious gift. I would like to hold onto that somehow, sometimes I even think it would be nice that you all stick around for a while longer….but I know you can’t and you shouldn’t.
I help out with the first morning service at one of our local parishes and last Sunday as our minister Ed and I were greeting people, one of the regulars, Rod, talked with excitement about his fishing trip to CO this week. Ed told him to bring back a big one, or at least a good story. But Rod turned to him and said “Oh, no, Ed, I’m a catch and release man, always, catch and release. “There’s something theological in that” was Ed’s response. I agree, --there is some theology in that, some spirituality, if you will, and of course I would add, some sustainability. What I’d like to do is unpack this a little in my invocation and benediction, because I think this “catch and release” idea fits with how we do things at Millbrook and fits this particular moment in our life cycle. Schools by nature are transitory communities. For us, Admissions does the catching; the rest of us prepare and anticipate the release of each group of seniors. And this can be the hardest part of the process.
So I hope I’ll make it a little easier for all of us by engaging in a two-part thought experiment that ties together the theology, spirituality, and sustainability of the releasing, this moment of letting go.
Here is the first part. The second comes at the benediction..
In anticipation of release, I ask us be still and call upon the One who we each claim as our creator and the source of our knowing. Let your presence and blessings be with us as we pause and prepare ourselves to take in all of this, not to rush through this hour thinking about what will happen next, while not being in the present; so that this will live in our memories vividly. Fill our hearts and minds with a heightened awareness of each other’s presence, and seniors, of being in the company of those who know you best, who love and support you and who are so proud of who you have become. As we celebrate the many accomplishments of this class, most significantly that each of you has made it this far, we ask to be reminded that there is no greater strength known but the strength of love. Amen.
