Conversation Starter 24 | Why End with Ceremony? with Andrew Black

In this conversation starter, Andrew anticipates graduation, asks 17 questions, and offers a final benediction.

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Transcript

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Dear listener, can it really be that the end is upon us? The conclusion of another year of work and prayer at the Academy? In the glorious mercy of the world's repetitions, we will say welcome back to the vast majority of our students, but how many of us can believe that there are some students our graduating class of 2026 for whom this Friday is a more final threshold, a crossing over into another kind of world, a point of no return? Do these students understand that Father Carr, Mr. Spears, Mr. Williams, and myself will, for example, once they have graduated, slough off the dusty monikers of a contrived formality and be instantly transformed, identified by our more diminutive titles Nate, Josh, Eric, Andrew, equals among equals, mere adults among mere adults? Have you recognized throughout your life these kinds of moments, moments of laudable accomplishment and life transition? Do you agree that in the midst of these moments it is the pomp and ritual of ceremony that offers to us all the possibility of rising adequately to meet them? What better way to end this year's series of conversation starters than with a conversation starter entirely comprised of questions? Will I risk inviting another anthemic single if I begin with this question What is life but a rushing ever onward of events if we don't recognize and honor the moments of repeated and real significance? Special attire, stately procession, musical fanfare, entrances and exits, speeches upon speeches, special words, calligraphy and letterhead, standing to sing, each of these absurd components, but doesn't each of these offer us a handle by which we might grasp reality? A reality which passes by so often without even the barest of acknowledgments. Can we not, through ceremony, glimpse the nature of reality, however fleetingly? Have you noticed that such ceremonies seem to anchor in our memory? That all the pomp and circumstance of that one occasion, for once semi adequately adorned, can then become a living reminder, an Ebenezer, an altar marking for us the faithfulness of the Lord. In other words, why not wear a robe? Tassel a cap and keep it balanced atop your head? Why not embrace the walking stately steps? Hold high your head, lift up your heart. Can you see that reality is breaking in upon you? Won't ceremony help you glimpse it and fix it in your mind? Then, as it grows in your memory, will you, like me, look back and realize the weight of what you have done and to what you are called? At this, the end of this year's worth of questions, would you excuse my offering instead a benediction? May you remember. May you shape the activity of your life around it. May the height and depth and breadth of your imagination increase to meet the faithfulness of God, who always exceeds it in every direction. For the earth will be full of the knowledge of God as waters cover the sea. Bless you, dear listener. Until our next conversation.