inkbluesky

smoke an abtract

Pass the Bread by Bill Moyers, Text of Baccalaureate Address at Hamilton College - May 20, 2006

 So I have been thinking seriously about what I might say to you in this Baccalaureate service. Frankly, I'm not sure anyone from my generation should be saying anything to your generation except, "We're sorry. We're really sorry for the mess you're inheriting. We are sorry for the war in Iraq. For the huge debts you will have to pay for without getting a new social infrastructure in return. We're sorry for the polarized country. The corporate scandals. The corrupt politics. Our imperiled democracy. We're sorry for the sprawl and our addiction to oil and for all those toxins in the environment. Sorry about all this, class of 2006. Good luck cleaning it up."

snip

I find I am alternatively afraid, cantankerous, bewildered, often hostile, sometimes gracious, and battered by a hundred new sensations every day. I can be filled with a pessimism as gloomy as the depth of the middle ages, yet deep within me I'm possessed of a hope that simply won't quit. A friend on Wall Street said one day that he was optimistic about the market, and I asked him, "Then why do you look so worried?" He replied, "Because I'm not sure my optimism is justified." Neither am I. So I vacillate between the determination to act, to change things, and the desire to retreat into the snuggeries of self, family and friends.

I wonder if any of us in this great, disputatious, over-analyzed, over-televised and under-tenderized country know what the deuce we're talking about, myself included. All my illusions are up for grabs, and I find myself re-assessing many of the assumptions that served me comfortable much of my life.

Earlier this week I heard on the radio a discussion in New York City about the new Disney Broadway production of Tarzan, the jungle hero so popular when I was growing up. I remember as a kid almost dislocating my tonsils trying to recreate his unearthly sound, swinging on a great vine in a graceful arc toward the rescue of his distressed mate, Jane, hollering bloody murder all the time. So what have we learned since? That Buster Crabbe and Johnny Weismuller, who played Tarzan in the movies, never made that noise. It was a recording of three men, one a baritone, one a tenor, and one a hog caller from Arkansas–all yelling to the top of their lungs. This world is hard on believers.

As a young man I was drawn to politics. I took part in two national campaigns, served in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, and have covered politics ever since. But I understand now what Thomas Jefferson meant back in 1789 when he wrote: "I am not a Federalist because I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men, whether in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or anything else. If I could not go to Heaven but with a party, I would not go there at all." Of course we know there'll be no parties in Heaven. No Democrats, no Republicans, no liberals, no conservatives, no libertarians or socialists. Just us Baptists.

The hardest struggle of all is to reconcile life's polar realities. I love books, Beethoven, and chocolate brownies. Yet how do I justify my pleasure in these in a world where millions are illiterate, the music never plays, and children go hungry through the night? How do I live sanely in a world so unsafe for so many?

I don't know what they taught you here at Hamilton about all this, but I trust you are not leaving here without thinking about how you will respond to the dissonance in our culture, the rivalry between beauty and bestiality in the world, and the conflicts in your own soul. All of us have to choose sides on this journey. But the question is not so much who we are going to fight against as it is which side of our own nature will we nurture: The side that can grow weary and even cynical and believe that everything is futile, or the side that for all the vulgarity, brutality, and cruelty, yearns to affirm, connect and signify. Albert Camus got it right: There is beauty in the world as well as humiliation, "And we have to strive, hard as it is, not to be unfaithful…in the presence of one or the other.

That's really what brings me here this afternoon. I did put myself in your place, and asked what I'd want a stranger from another generation to tell me if I had to sit through his speech. Well, I'd want to hear the truth: The truth is, life's a tough act, the world's a hard place, and along the way you will meet a fair share of fools, knaves and clowns–even act the fool yourself from time to time when your guard is down or you've had too much wine. I'd like to be told that I will experience separation, loss and betrayal, that I'll wonder at times where have all the flowers gone.

I would want to be told that while life includes a lot of luck, life is more than luck. It is sacrifice, study, and work; appointments kept, deadlines met, promises honored. I'd like to be told that it's okay to love your country right or wrong, but it's not right to be silent when your country is wrong. And I would like to be encouraged not to give up on the American experience. To remember that the same culture which produced the Ku Klux Klan, Tom DeLay and Abu Ghraib, also brought forth the Peace Corps, Martin Luther King and Hamilton College.

And I would like to be told that there is more to this life than I can see, earn, or learn in my time. That beyond the day-to-day spectacle are cosmic mysteries we don't understand. That in the meantime–and the meantime is where we live–we infinitesimal particles of creation carry on the miracle of loving, laughing and being here now, by giving, sharing and growing now.

Let me tell you one of my favorite stories. I read it a long time ago and it's stayed with me. There was a man named Shalom Aleicheim. He was one of the accursed of the Earth. Every misfortune imaginable befell him. He lost his wife, his children neglected him, his house burned down, his job disappeared–everything he touched turned to dust. Yet through all this Shalom kept returning good for evil everywhere he could until he died. When the angels heard he was arriving at Heaven's gate, they hurried down to greet him. Even the Lord was there, so great was this man's fame for goodness. It was the custom in Heaven that every newcomer was interrogated by the prosecuting angel, to assure that all trespasses on Earth had been atoned. But when Shalom reached those gates, the prosecuting angel arose, and for the first time in the memory of Heaven, said, "There are no charges." Then the angel for the defense arose and rehearsed all the hardships this man had endured and recounted how in all the difficult circumstances of his life he had remained true to himself and returned good for evil.

When the angel was finished, the Lord said, "Not since Job himself have we heard of a life such as this one." And then, turning to Shalom, he said, "Ask, and it shall be given to you."

The old man raised his eyes and said, "Well, if I could start every day with a hot buttered roll…" And at that the Lord and all the angels wept, at the preciousness of what he was asking for, at the beauty of simple things : a buttered roll, a clean bed, a beautiful summer day, someone to love and be loved by. These supply joy and meaning on this earthly journey.

The general message of Mr Moyer's amazing speech could also be said and applied to every generation, but now it seems more applicable then ever. Here we are at the beginning of a new century and even someone as contrarian and generally suspicsious of authority as me knows that we need a country with people that occupy postions of responsiblity and authority to have wisdom and vision. Where is the new great vision for a new century, It seems that now as through most of history, the political extremists, the peddlers of paranoia, demi-god religious zealots are trying to push America back to the age of Robber Barons, snake oil, and war as enterprise. Who would have thought that in entering the new century that the people of vision, of rationalism, of justice and the rule of law would be a struggling minority. Who would have thought that so many would buy into the radical sick visions of G.W. Bush and Osama Bin Laden. Those that are young and full of energy and ideas about making the world a better place have your work cut out for you; you'll be battling the blood thirsty fanatics like Bin Laden and the paranoid over reactors like Bush and his cult of supporters, plus the economic social-darwinists. If you plan to base your world view on  fairness, justice (not just blind revenge), valid reasoning, and tolerance you have a rough road ahead. The worse aspects of your own nature will pull you in the wrong direction at times and there will always be someone around to encourage it. Fighting the unreasonable with reason is wearing, maybe this generation will have the kind of lifelong energy and ideas to finally beat down those that embrace pettiness, ignorance, and violence as a way of life.