President Lentini, Bishop Barres, Members of the Board of Trustees, Members of the Molloy University community, and esteemed graduates, I am very humbled to receive this honor and delighted to be with you on this extraordinary day. Be assured that I will treasure this time in a very special way.
For the past eight years, I have been privileged to lead Catholic Charities in the US as we serve over 15 million poor or vulnerable people each year. A significant responsibility I and my team hold is to protect those among us who are suffering from poverty, hunger, homelessness, mental illness, discrimination, people fleeing for their lives as migrants and refugees, and those reeling from the aftermath of devastating natural disasters. Over these years, I have been privileged to meet with many broken and frightened sisters and brothers of ours. I have listened to their stories and shared their tears. And I have been changed.
Given all that, I would like to share four short lessons with you as my own being has been stretched by what I have encountered. May these eight words guide you throughout your lives as you open your hearts more fully to be present to those who suffer or those along the margins of society.
I offer them to accompany you into the future as you make use of the fine education, in the Dominican tradition, that you undoubtedly have had here at Molloy. For you who are graduating today, I would like to invite you to be agents for the good in applying your scholarship and training toward creating a society that is more compassionate and more respectful of differences. So here are the eight words! (Short is good for commencement speeches, right?!)
- Seek truth
- Make peace
- Reverence life
- Show up
Seek Truth
As beneficiaries of a higher education, you join a long line of scholars committed to searching for truth to address the social and moral dilemmas of our times.
Regardless of your particular field of expertise, you embody the depth of a Molloy education as you search to find what is true and good and right in bringing about a more compassionate society. We seek truth through study, dialog, discernment – never being timid about engaging in difficult conversations on complex topics with people who may hold very different perspectives from ours.
By way of example, as a Dominican and a clinical psychologist, I have long been engaged in probing how severely and persistently mentally ill people, many of whom are living rough on the streets, can be helped. To direct the richness of my clinical training toward working with others to find solutions is an obligation I embrace by virtue of my Dominican spirituality and by whatever intellectual capacities I might have been blessed with. This is not easy work. Mental illness is not a popular topic and the mentally ill are often treated as the ostracized lepers of society. Working in concert with other practitioners, with members of Congress, with leaders in the faith community, and many other leaders who are concerned about those who have been relegated to the margins of society, I am committed to search for insight, for what is truthful about the reality around us, and to challenge others who may not want to direct resources toward mental illness and chronic homelessness. We are committed to discover gospel-driven ways of addressing dire human need - even when such conversations can be quite difficult, even contentious. Engaging in bipartisan dialogue in a way that is productive and respectful is the only way for us to move forward.
I would challenge you who hold the privilege of this fine education, to always hold near to your heart the question of how you will direct your learning toward the good of humankind, especially those who are most vulnerable. Always seek what is true. Never waiver from what is the right thing to do on behalf of those who have been left out or struggle to make it through life. Do not be timid about speaking out on unpopular topics. And always refrain from demonizing the one who may hold a diametrically opposite view from your own.
Seek truth.
Make Peace
Along with the search for Truth, reconciliation resides at the very core of a peaceful society. Make peace. We are living in the midst of deeply disturbing divisiveness, a time when civil discourse has reached an all-time low, a time in which building relationships has ceded to erecting walls and fences that insulate mindsets, solidify intractable positions and ultimately destroy the possibility of respectful engagement or relationship with the differing other. The significance of engaging in educated dialog in the service of establishing relationships, building understanding and reconciling differences, bids us to assume a truly countercultural role in society today. That is, rather than succumbing to the pull toward fractiousness and cold stand offs, we are charged with finding ways to counter the culture of division by serving as agents of reconciliation and peace-building. That is what higher learning prepares us to do.
Be fearless in entering into the space of making peace. Bullying has no place in the heart of a learned woman or man. Take pains to convene persons from opposing perspectives so that the promise of relational healing and mutual understanding can emerge.
Seek truth. Make peace.
Reverence Life
These times are replete with examples of the wanton destruction of life: human life, the environment, pollution, war, to name a few. We have been exhorted by Pope Francis to hear and connect the “cry of the earth with the cries of the poor.” The challenge for each of us who are inheritors of advanced education is how will we use our knowledge, our writing, our scholarship, our speaking and our teaching, our venues of employment, to address these cries. We are all connected to one another and to creation. We are dependent upon one another as we are dependent on our environment to support and sustain us. Take action in your own lives and advocate for a culture that treasures our common home and all who live within it. We have no time to spare as the vulnerability of our planet and the fragility of humans and all of creation strains under the burdens we have unnecessarily inflicted upon it. Graduates, do not be deaf to the cry of the earth and the cries of the poor. All creation is sacred. Stay passionate in advocating on behalf of life in all its forms.
Seek truth, Make peace, Reverence Life.
Show Up!
Pope Francis tells us that the face of God is mercy. We have been charged by our Holy Father to promote a “culture of care” and compassion throughout the world, to work tirelessly on behalf of those who are excluded, to stand with those who are suffering and to enter into an encounter that opens the way for others to know and experience the tremendous and abundant love of God. We cannot do this through computer screens or social media. We need to show up! Showing up means taking the Parable of the Good Samaritan seriously. It means when we encounter someone in difficult straits, we don’t walk to the other side of the road and pretend we don’t see them. It means, like the Good Samaritan, that we approach them and extend compassion. It means we listen to their story; it means we try to help. Showing up changes us. I have shown up at the cages along the border that held unaccompanied minors; I have shown up in homeless shelters; I have shown up in psychiatric units; I have shown up in war-torn Ukraine. I have shown up in emergency rooms, and many other very sad places. Showing up opens our hearts to resevoirs of compassion we never realized we had.
Many of you may not be directly engaged with the poorest of the poor, but every one of us stands in need of compassion. How we treat one another, how we treat our families and coworkers and colleagues, how we respond to the homeless folks living under the city’s bridges – this is the measure of our mercy as we show up. In the spirit of an educated person, your life will give witness through the kindness of your actions just as significantly as any words you may speak or write.
Seek truth. Make peace. Reverence life. Show up.
So, just eight words to remember as you leave here today. That’s all!
May God’s blessings accompany each of you on your journeys. Congratulations!