Tim Bleecker's 2008 Banquet Speech
This is my 7th Caritas banquet speech. Some of you have been to all seven banquets, and you might think that by now I’d have run out of things to say. In fact, you’d be right. I have a repetitive, boring old speech for you here, but I’m not going to use it. No, I’m going to do what I’ve always dreamed of doing: rip it up and just speak to you from my heart. [Rip up speech.]
Hmm. . . . Nothing. . . . But it always seems to work in the movies. . . . Where did I put that spare copy?
So much for listening to my heart.
To be honest, I’m a little tired of being told in movies that we should follow our hearts. What does that mean, anyway? What can it mean, except that you should do what your emotions tell you, what your impulses and inclinations tell you?
Every age has its own great dangers. The Greeks faced the Persian invasions and the wars between their own city-states; the Romans faced internal decay and the invasions of Germanic tribes; medieval Europe faced the plague and the attacks of Islam, Vikings, and the Magyars; in the 20th Century, communism and fascism threatened to overwhelm civilization. Here we are in the 21st Century, having made it across Bill Clinton’s bridge somehow, and I find myself wondering what our age’s greatest dangers are. Some would say Islamo-fascism; some would say abortion and the culture of death. Obviously trans fats must rank way up there. I want to add to those something more insidious: radical egoism.
We are the most comfortable people in the history of the world. Many of the things we assume everyone is entitled to—like a car, central heating, hot showers and flush toilets, good healthcare, a computer, chocolate—were beyond the imagination of even the wealthiest people of past ages. St. Paul wrote, “If we have food and covering, with these we will be content.” Here we are tonight with a good meal, all of us clothed appropriately (and I even checked my fly before I came up), so we have nothing to worry about, right? Yet our comforts have not made our culture more grateful to God and thankful to our ancestors. Often they have only fed our egotism and made us feel superior to those who lived in past ages.
As Theodore Dalrymple points out in his brilliant little book In Praise of Prejudice, ours is an individualistic age that considers it healthiest to follow your own, self-created beliefs. Dalrymple notes that biologist Richard Dawkins, a famous atheist, has presented a new set of Ten Commandments to replace the old, traditional ones. (Not the Hogan’s Heroes and Family Feud guy, Norm; that was Richard Dawson.) The Dawkins commandments include: “a) Test all things; always check your ideas against the facts; and be ready to discard a cherished belief if it does not conform to them; b) Form independent opinions on the basis of your own reason and experience; do not allow yourself to be blindly led by others; c) Question everything.”
To many of us, these actually sound pretty good—authentic and honest. We don’t want to accept things blindly. We want to be thinking, self-critical people. But as Dalrymple points out, “the great majority of our knowledge . . . is knowledge by authority,” not gained by our own experience. We couldn’t really function if we had to test all of our knowledge about history by researching and comparing all the primary sources, just to accept, for example, that the Battle of Hastings happened in 1066 and was won by the Normans.
Another problem with doubting everything until it’s proven is that it leaves out the hard, central fact of history—that God became a man and died for us, then came back to life. Trying to construct your own personal morality, your personal worldview, without Christ is both naïve and dangerous. Trying to educate while leaving out God is educationally crippling. People in the Middle Ages didn’t know about bacteria, or electricity, or subatomic particles. Would we be content now to give our children an education that ignored all the scientific understanding gained during the last 500 years? Well, I’m going
to go out on a limb here and suggest that the radical individualism that dominates our culture and our educational system is just as limited. It permits only the evidence of the senses or the emotions; it has no room for God except in the privacy of the individual’s heart. It implies that God exists or doesn’t exist depending on what each person decides; that the main imperative in life is to make your own belief system based on your own likes and dislikes. You must follow your heart. But, says Dalrymple, a child who absorbs this worldview and grows up to be guided by his own likes and dislikes does not therefore find himself free. “On the contrary, he is a slave to his own prejudices.”
A Christian, classical education does not teach students to follow their hearts. It doesn’t assume that all the important answers are to be found in the students themselves. It doesn’t lead them to believe that whatever they desire is good, whatever they believe is true, and whatever they enjoy is beautiful. At Caritas, we begin with the truths of Christianity as our students’ foundation, and we build on it with the best of tradition.
The word “tradition” comes to us from the Latin verb traho, trahere, tradidi, traditum (always learn all four principle parts of your verbs!), which means “to hand down” or “to surrender.” Tradition isn’t forced on us; the previous generation hands down the best that they have found or received. Tradition is the treasure that our predecessors surrender to us. As E. Christian Kopff says, “Not to receive a classical
education is to suffer . . . an alienation from our own history.”
We don’t still hold to Greek notions of heroism, as exemplified by Achilles or Odysseus, but studying the Greeks gives a context for our own culture. We don’t still speak Latin, but studying Latin certainly helps us understand English much better. (And Norm, watching that DVD you use in your marriage seminars, “Finding Your Inner Latin Lover,” isn’t the same thing as studying Latin.) Our Christian faith and our classical heritage form a strong foundation and ground floor on which to build whatever an age requires. The cathedrals were built on that foundation; so were the poems of Dante, Shakespeare, Tennyson, and Richard Wilbur.
For better or worse, children today are growing up in a postmodern world. How do we prepare them to be Christian warriors in this world? It’s fine to say that they should be salt and light, but what will keep them from being more influenced by the tastelessness and darkness of the culture? According to a 2006 study by George Barna, “most twenty-somethings disengage from active participation in the Christian faith during their young adult years.” Sixty-one percent of people in their 20’s used to go to church but no longer do, 19% have never been active in a church, and only 20% are still active.
Christians in high school need more than emotion and good intentions; they need church history, to see themselves in the context of the ages. They need help developing their own worldview and keeping it grounded in Christ; they need to see the relevance of Christ and their faith to everything they study and do. They also need the support of Christian adults and peers, so they can reach out in strength to unbelieving friends. Look around you. We represent many different denominations and towns, but all of us have come together tonight because we love Christ, and we want the generations that follow us to love him, too.
It’s easy for me to tell you that Caritas is a wonderful place both for education and for Christian nurturing, but I can’t do better than let a few of the students say it in their own words. Recently one spoke of the “great Christian atmosphere in which to meet other Christians and form new friendships.” Another said: “I’m challenged academically; the teachers are fantastic. They provide you with skills that will make you a better student and a better person.” And another said that “Caritas is the epitome of a family school; the students, the teachers, and even the parents become a part of this inner society. . . . Each student helps the others achieve their goals both intellectually and emotionally throughout the year.” Another expressed gratitude that “you can be yourself and not worry about what others think, because you are loved and accepted for who you are.” And one student said, “Caritas has helped me discover my true identity. Before Caritas, I was very self-conscious and had no friends. Now I am surrounded by warmth and laughter. Caritas is a true family.”
It’s been a quiet year at Caritas, where the female teachers are all strong, the male teachers are all good looking, and all the students are above average. Quiet, but not always easy. At times we have all felt the burden of trying to balance tradition with imagination, and discipline with compassion, but that is part of what makes Caritas special as a school, a community, and a family. I confess that once this winter, while I sat in my office with the darkness closing in and civilization crumbling around me, I found myself saying aloud, “I can’t do this.” I looked up, and there was someone bending toward me, smiling elfishly. I thought maybe it was Lisa Sequeira, our head teacher, checking to see if I was asleep, but the nimbus of fluorescent light behind her half blinded me. Then I heard a voice, with an Anglo-elvish accent, say, “This task was appointed to you, Frodo Baggins, and if you do not find a way, no one will.” I am not Frodo Baggins, and Cate Blanchett couldn’t make it tonight, but I can tell you that the task of keeping Caritas alive and growing is appointed to all of you tonight. And if you do not find a way, no one will.