Charge to the Class of 2013
Treasure the teachers in your life By President Theodore J. Wardlaw
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ell, look at you! All dressed up, and somewhere to go! Many of you already know where that somewhere is; others of you don’t yet know, but will. And, before you leave this place, this moment, and step into the future, it is my great privilege to offer to you a charge. And my charge this year has to do with teachers. I have three things I want to say to you about teachers. First of all, I charge you to remember your teachers. If it’s possible, I charge you to remember them gratefully. That will be easier with some than with others, I understand that. When I was in high school, I attended a school established in 1783 as a military school for boys, which meant that, even in my time there, almost two hundred years later, academics were mixed with military discipline. Even after it had become a public school there in Augusta, Georgia, I was, like almost everybody else, in the R.O.T.C. program and required to go to class in a military uniform (brass and shoes shined nightly so that, maybe, I would pass inspection). There was a teacher there, a math teacher, who was a survivor of the Bataan Death March. He had been captured by the Imperial Japanese Army after the three-month-long Battle of Bataan in the Philippines during World War II. And, along with 60 to 80,000 other prisoners of war—mainly Filipino and American prisoners—he had been marched for 80 miles on what became known as the March of Death. It was a march characterized by brutal physical abuse of the prisoners—they were mistreated, beaten, and bayoneted—and untold numbers of them died as a result of injuries on that march; or, if not injuries, then outright execution; and, if not execution, then the exhaustion that came from the sweltering heat or starvation or absence of medical care. Hundreds and hundreds of soldiers either died or were put to death on that march, but this man survived. I believe that march broke him, though; or, at least he seemed broken in that year that I had him for math. It was pretty well-established that he drank his way through the school day, and I had him for sixth period; and, let’s just put it this way, we didn’t learn a lot of math. Sometimes he would throw books or chalk at people; sometimes he would just
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randomly tell someone, “Hey Butthead, get your books and get out of here.” He told me that a lot, actually. But he told me something else that I have not forgotten. This was the year in which my father was dying; and all my teachers knew that, but most of them felt too awkward to address it with me. You know how that is. We’re often so awkward around death. Someone is dying, and unless they bring it up, we go to the house and clear our throats and talk about football. People were like that around me; my dad was dying and nobody at school said anything. Except for this teacher. He’d pull me aside, often, and look at me with such a sad, tormented, kind face—the face of someone who understood suffering—and he would say, “I know about your dad, and I’m sorry about that; but you’re a survivor; you’re going to be all right.” This survivor told me that I was a survivor. There weren’t many people in my life at that time who had the language or the self-awareness to tell me that. So, for whatever reason, this bizarre, sad, broken, kind man is at the top of the list of the teachers whom I remember. Remember your teachers. You’ve had some wonderful ones here. They are the most important people in the ecosystem of this Seminary and of any academic institution. May you remember your favorite teachers here forever. And on their behalf, I would encourage you to reach out to them, in those moments when you need some help; because you are every bit as much a part of them now, as they are of you. Remember and give thanks for your teachers. And secondly, I charge you to stay alert to those who are preparing, even now, to become your next teachers. The important teachers of your life, after all— assuming, of course, that you continue to cultivate a teachable spirit—are not just that rarified collection of professors who help you get a diploma. They are, also, the people—some of them, at least—with whom you will work and with whom you will serve. One of them might be the Clerk of Session in the parish to which you are going; or the choir director, or that wise one who reminds you of your grandparents, or that child who shares with you some profound spiritual truth. Virtually anyone, at any point in time—however humble or exalted
Be that kind of teacher— a knight of faith, a person whose feet are on the ground and whose eyes and soul are cast toward heaven.
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