Page 15 - The Gonzaga Record 1989
P. 15
HOMILY AT 6th YEAR GRADUATION MASS
Sixth year, parents, staff. There are many thoughts in your minds tonight.
There are many themes we might take up now-thanks for the past and
hope for the future. The readings tonight, the feast of the Sacred Heart,
the celebration of the human heart of Christ, are about compassion.
They are about looking for the lost, bringing back the stray, bandaging
the wounded. They explain Jesus' death as a death of compassion, its
cause, concern for human beings alienated from God and from one
another.
Most of our time in school, when we look back at it, seems to have
been spent on other things. We spent our time acquiring knowledge and
developing our skills, mostly in class, often on the sportsfield,
occasionally debating in the library, acting on the stage or taking part in
the many other activities of school life. Our quest was explained to our
class more than once in terms of the Greek word 'arete' -excellence. We
were in pursuit of excellence and perhaps too of achievement, for the
Greeks were as competitive as ourselves. We were trained to develop our
talents and sharpen our minds.
But there are other dimensions of ourselves and I suppose they will
emerge this evening. For this is not a prizegiving. It is a time of taking
leave. For the teachers and staff another generation leaves the school. For
the sixth year it is a time of leaving school but above all they take leave
of one another. Every class has its own character, its unique atmosphere.
Through six or even ten long years of education we shaped one another
- our attitudes to things, our expectations of the future, our sense of our
place in the world. We shared common experiences, bad as well as good.
We reacted to one another in spontaneous and unguarded ways. We
made, for better or worse, a group of people where we were insiders or
outsiders, happy or unhappy.
What has the human dimension of life together been? How have we
been human together? 'Human' can of course mean many things. How
have we been compassionate together? How have we developed our
feelings as well as our heads or our skills? There will have been special
friendships. There may be hard feelings, even grudges. Can they be
reconciled? Have we learned to be understanding and compassionate?
The heart of the Gospel message is about excellence or 'arete'. But the
unique perspective of Jesus is that excellence is, above all, to be found
in the quality of our humanity, in our compassion. 'Be perfect as your
heavenly Father is perfect' means for Jesus the perfection of the
compassionate heart of God. It is revealed in the compassionate human
heart of Jesus.
Have we learned to be human with one another? Have we learned how
13
Sixth year, parents, staff. There are many thoughts in your minds tonight.
There are many themes we might take up now-thanks for the past and
hope for the future. The readings tonight, the feast of the Sacred Heart,
the celebration of the human heart of Christ, are about compassion.
They are about looking for the lost, bringing back the stray, bandaging
the wounded. They explain Jesus' death as a death of compassion, its
cause, concern for human beings alienated from God and from one
another.
Most of our time in school, when we look back at it, seems to have
been spent on other things. We spent our time acquiring knowledge and
developing our skills, mostly in class, often on the sportsfield,
occasionally debating in the library, acting on the stage or taking part in
the many other activities of school life. Our quest was explained to our
class more than once in terms of the Greek word 'arete' -excellence. We
were in pursuit of excellence and perhaps too of achievement, for the
Greeks were as competitive as ourselves. We were trained to develop our
talents and sharpen our minds.
But there are other dimensions of ourselves and I suppose they will
emerge this evening. For this is not a prizegiving. It is a time of taking
leave. For the teachers and staff another generation leaves the school. For
the sixth year it is a time of leaving school but above all they take leave
of one another. Every class has its own character, its unique atmosphere.
Through six or even ten long years of education we shaped one another
- our attitudes to things, our expectations of the future, our sense of our
place in the world. We shared common experiences, bad as well as good.
We reacted to one another in spontaneous and unguarded ways. We
made, for better or worse, a group of people where we were insiders or
outsiders, happy or unhappy.
What has the human dimension of life together been? How have we
been human together? 'Human' can of course mean many things. How
have we been compassionate together? How have we developed our
feelings as well as our heads or our skills? There will have been special
friendships. There may be hard feelings, even grudges. Can they be
reconciled? Have we learned to be understanding and compassionate?
The heart of the Gospel message is about excellence or 'arete'. But the
unique perspective of Jesus is that excellence is, above all, to be found
in the quality of our humanity, in our compassion. 'Be perfect as your
heavenly Father is perfect' means for Jesus the perfection of the
compassionate heart of God. It is revealed in the compassionate human
heart of Jesus.
Have we learned to be human with one another? Have we learned how
13
