Thanks and Supplication in the House of the King

Fr. Joel Tabora, S.J.

Baccalaureate Mass
Ateneo de Naga University
23 March 2007

You have been here in this House of God before.  You have experienced its special space, filled with the colors of earth, yet bathed with heavenly hues.  You have marveled at the stained-glass Windows of the King, admired the Bikol flare in the oils of the Madonna and Child, the Holy Family and the Stations of the Cross.  You have noticed how the native pili and the sili make up the baroque flourishing of the pews, the confessionals, the ceiling. On the high altar, you have welcomed the presence of St. Francis Xavier and St. Ignatius of Loyola. You have gazed at the Crucified Lord with Mary and John, Jesus entrusting John to his mother, then entrusting his mother to John. 

You have been in this Church before. Here, you have worshipped.  Here you have talked to your Lord and your King.  Many times, before an exam, or as news of a new crisis in the family broke, or after the mark you received was lower than expected, you came here, and in its sacred silence you talked to your King.  Or you talked to Ina. You expressed your fears.  Your prayer was that despite all, you make it in the end, that this graduation day be granted you.  That this Graduation Day come.
         
It has come. All of a sudden, a cap and a toga.  All of a sudden, a Eucharistic celebration in which diplomas and medallions are to be blessed.  All of a sudden, the celebration of inclusion among friends and companions who struggled with you through similar courses, under familiar teachers, passed similar exams, submitted similar projects, and were not found wanting.  This day then was long in coming, even though entering college was like just yesterday.  Its value is all the more appreciated because so many did not make it.  You are a graduating class of 17 graduate students and 658. Four years ago, the number accepted in Freshman Year was 1388.  Of your number, however, 367 are from previous semesters and years.  That means, of the original freshman number, only 291or 20.9 percent are graduating today.  Necessarily, then, a sense of gratitude!  Typhoon Reming tore the roof off of the Santos building; it crumpled our covered walks; it shattered the mighty curtain window of the library.  With its 165 kph winds, Reming lifted, twisted and killed our trees.  It could have devastated your parents’ source of livelihood; it could have blown away the academic year, including this day.

But it did not.  It only led you to respond to hunger with food, to damaged houses with repairs, to traumatized psyches with compassion, to natural destruction with human construction.  It called forth a resiliency in adversity, a bondedness in woundedness, a generosity in misfortune that saved the day, but also saved the academic year.  So it was possible still to learn in class, still to read in the library, still to research in the Internet, still to compete in the intramurals, still to finally make the projects work.  Shall we therefore not give thanks at this Mass?  To give thanks for teachers, personnel and administrators who kept this academic year going, despite the fact that Typhoon Reming victimized them too, some severely?  More profoundly, to give thanks for parents and benefactors who long before this year were already laying the groundwork for this happy graduation?  To give thanks for talents, skills, psychological well-being, indeed life, both physical and spiritual – all part of your pre-graduation giftedness for which you give thanks.

Last but not least, we give thanks for you.  No matter how good your parents, it was not they who took your exams.  No matter how generous your benefactors, it was not they who sat in class and learned the calculus or counseling theory or the insight behind Anselm’s “God is that than which non greater can be conceived.” No matter how intense your teachers’ cura personalis, it was not they who gave up nights out with the barkada for nights in of coping with brownouts to get the assigned work done.  This day has come because you freely chose this day – not only yesterday when you were still rushing to complete requirements, but every time you chose to study, to learn, to grow – not only in knowledge, but in your reflected relationships with others, your friends, your family, your society, your God. 

Your God.  Your Christ.  Your King.  It is good then that you come to his house on this happy day to give thanks. Seeing how in your parents, in your brothers and sisters, in your teachers, in your friends, your God has been loving you – even unto death on a Cross – perhaps with St. Ignatius it is only appropriate for you to ask anew: “If Lord you have done so much for me in love, what have I done for you?  What am I doing for you?  What ought I do for you?  What ought I do for you with my education?  What ought I do for you with the competence this education has engendered in me? What ought I do for you when the hard choice must be made between right and wrong?  What ought I do for you when the images of hunger, homelessness, malnutrition, nakedness, ignorance and suffering in Bikol contrast so powerfully with images of progress, plenty, high technology and luxury in other societies?  What ought I do for you with the discipline I have learned? 

When you make the answer clear, Lord, when you call us to your side, when you mission us to work with you first for the Kingdom of God – primum regnum Dei – may we then also not be found wanting.  May we be quick to do your will, ready “to give and not to count the cost, to fight and not to head the wounds, to toil and not to seek for rest, to labor and not to ask for reward, save that of knowing that we do your holy will, Lord.” May we be quick in wanting to distinguish ourselves in following the Lord – through his suffering and death, to the glory of the resurrection. 

It is fitting that on this happy day you come to this Church of Christ the King to give thanks.  But it also imperative that you come in supplication. Even as you are awed by the many blessings you have received from God, the truth is that it is possible for you to forget his blessings, and consider all your achievement;  it is possible to overlook his grace, and arrogate to yourself all your knowledge, your sharpness, your craftiness, your self sufficiency.  As the Gospel warns, it is possible to be numbered among those who would kill Jesus.  Having been close to Jesus, it is possible to be a Judas.  Having once shouted out his praises, “Hosannah!  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” it is possible suddenly to cry, “Crucify him, crucify him!” It is possible to refuse to see his love in the sunshine after a typhoon, in the generosity of volunteers, in the excitement of a house build, in the success of a business, in the awesome colors and shapes of an endless Lapis-mural-of-life colored by God’s human fingers.  Your supplication then, your graduation prayer, must be:  Throughout my life, Lord, be with me.  Conquer me.  Liberate me.  Uplift me.

You have been here in this House of God many times. In the joy of your Graduation Day, allow me to urge you to return often to this Church of your King. Return to it regularly. Return to it as the Lord’s disciple seeking solace.  Or as the Prodigal Son seeking the Lord’s embrace. Let its Bikol-baroque images be imprinted in your consciousness.  Let its heavenly hues color your earthly journey. Let its silence always afford you deep communication with your self and deeper communication with your Lord and King. Let it remind you always of what is first in the Atenean’s heart:  Primum regnum Dei.  First the Kingdom of God.  First the Will of the King.

It was his Will that this day come.  It has come, because you accepted his Will.  Let this be the promise of your entry eternally into his Kingdom! 

Congratulations to you all.