Serpents, Doves, and Love

For our summer From the Headmaster note, I'm sharing with you the message I shared with the Class of 2024 at their June 1st graduation ceremony. I hope that you're all having a wonderful, restful summer. 

Well, Seniors, here are my parting words for you today. I want to give you the final piece of the puzzle for the year.

So far I’ve talked to you about everything from synchronicity and one of Bishop Jake’s favorite dismissals—you heard it last night: “God be in my head and in my understanding; God be in my eyes and in my looking; God be in my mouth and in my speaking; God be in my heart and in my thinking; God be at my end and at my departing.”

We also talked about synchronization and how we all interact as independent oscillators (think about those metronomes synchronizing) and how that interaction makes community inevitable. So if community is inevitable, let’s create one of love and respect. Lastly I shared the wonderful sermon given by Dr. King about Jesus’s command to his disciples before they went out on their own: “be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” Dr. King used that as a metaphor to talk about the power of being able to hold contrasting ideas in your mind at once, something I think the world really needs today.

The last piece of the puzzle I give you today.  I’ve run into this theme of juxtapositions several times this Easter season. In the ten or so stories of Jesus after the resurrection, one of the common themes that I see in these spiritual stories is the inclusion of simple, everyday worldly details. In one story, after the Resurrection it talks very specifically about Jesus eating a piece of broiled fish. In another he tells some fishermen to try the other side of the boat for fishing and they catch 153 fish. You want a fun journey down a rabbit hole, start looking at all the ways that people have tried to explain why 153 fish… In my favorite story, on the road to Emmaeus, Jesus is walking with two of the disciples who don’t recognize him until he breaks the bread at their meal. Instantly, their eyes were opened. It is in the simple acts of everyday life that important spiritual truths can show up.

We heard a version of this at Canterbury Cathedral last Sunday in the Dean’s homily. It was actually a take on some of the most well-known verses in the New Testament from the Gospel of John chapter 3. Nicodemus asks how to be saved and Jesus replies that he must be born again of water and the spirit. The combination of the Earthly (water) and the Heavenly (the spirit). Again, the simple acts of everyday life lead to spiritual truths. I think it is the combination of these two ideas of the Earthly and the Spiritual that we are called to. I hope by now you are seeing that this is one of the primary messages you have gotten ever since you’ve been here, to be amazing thinkers (wise as serpents) and have a heart for others (innocent as doves).

You are getting ready to leave this wonderful bubble where these lessons are reinforced for you every day. You’re going out into a world that is utterly and completely broken. But here’s a secret: the world has always been utterly and completely broken. And we are called to live right here and right now in this broken world. This is our time. This is your time. The most important thing you can do is to live the lessons you’ve been taught here. Be wise, be gentle, live a life of integrity, help those who need help, be worthy of the advantages you’ve been given in this life. By taking care of these simple details of everyday life and the way that YOU live into them, you will be living a life of great spiritual truth and impact as well.

What holds these contrasting ideas together? Well, to answer that, I have here a letter written 30 years ago to the students of ESA from the Archbishop of Cape Town, Desmond Tutu, offering his congratulations on their graduation and a little advice. It is as relevant as or even more relevant today than it was 30 years ago.
Archbishop Tutu was a friend and colleague of our first Bishop, Willis Henton, whom our chapel is named after. Bishop Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984 for his work in fighting apartheid, but if you’ve ever seen an interview with him, one of the things you might most remember is his laugh. He loved to laugh and it was a great laugh. I’m going to read a little of this letter (I promise it’s not long). He begins with a euphemism.

“What we are is God’s gift to us. What we become is our gift to God.”

Now, most graduation speeches would focus on the second part of that and admonish you to strive to achieve great things, but Archbishop Tutu focused on the first sentence, and uses it to preach about the other great lesson that we hope you have learned here, the thing that binds all together in perfection, LOVE. Love of God, Love of neighbor, Love of self.

Bishop Tutu goes on to say that we are made in God’s image, that each of you is a unique expression of who God is. “You are infinitely precious, whoever you are, whatever you may look like, wherever you came from, whatever you have or have not achieved. God loves you enormously, and the wonderful thing is that this love does not depend on you. It is a free gift.”

“Chew on this truth, and you will discover more and more of its flavor as the days and the years go on. There is always more richness in God’s love, even if you live to be 120.”

Lastly, he says, “The other thing you will discover is that your neighbor is also made in God’s image, is also infinitely precious. God loves him. God loves her, just as they are. When you begin to understand a little of God’s love for you, you will find yourself seeing your neighbor with different eyes. Try it.” And I can hear him chuckling at this point.

As you leave this school beneath the oaks, take these two lessons with you. Hold contrasting ideas in your mind. Be like serpents and doves, wise and gentle. And remember, it’s all about love. We are proud of you, and this broken world needs you. Congratulations!