Graduation Mass 2006

One would comb the scriptures in vain searching for a biblical instance of a graduation exercise. Schools as we know now them did not exist in biblical times, but there certainly was the practice of what we call home education. Much of that, I suppose, was of the practical sort: the handing on of domestic and professional skills. Of the subjects mathematics, reading and writing, these may have prevailed as in an unsystematic and sketchy course of study–I really don’t know. But the one thing that was all important in learning was the knowledge of the law of God. Religion was the one thing above all else that had to be learnt. For the Jews this meant a thorough knowledge of the first five books of the Old Testament and conformity to the Jewish way of religious living. For Christians it meant a familiarity with the Gospels, with the moral teaching and liturgical life of the Church. Religion was the subject of all subjects. If for no other reason than for the sake of faith, one learned how to read; one pored over the great sagas of the faith (from Creation, the Fall, the Flood, the Exodus, giving of the Law, right through the Incarnation of Christ, His Passion, Resurrection, Ascension and–what we will celebrate tomorrow–Pentecost), and one mastered the articles of the Creed. One was also expected to practice the mores of Christian living enshrined in the New Testament, in the Commandments and in the Christian exercise of charity. These two basic things, knowledge of the fundamental truths of belief and the observance of the moral life, formed the unbroken thread we find in education for the 2000 year old history of the Church. These fundamentals have been passed on through all generations.

The centrality of religion in the education of the Christian owes to the fact that what religion proposes is the most important of things to be known, and the fact that its subject has to do not with the passing things of this world, but with those of the "world without end."

Becoming an educated person generally–and an educated religious person in particular–is both an expansive experience and a narrowing one, an addition and a subtraction. Here’s what I mean. Education expands the mind, of course, to embrace the universal body of human knowledge. Knowing in this sense adds something to the mind, much like the growth of a bodily organism, making it progress from smaller to greater size. This additive aspect of knowledge at the same time entails a narrowing down of the objects known. By this I mean that when one learns, for example, the multiplication tables one does not also learn all the possible wrong answers to each set of numbers to be multiplied: it suffices merely to know the correct formulas; similarly, when one knows the laws of physics or biology, one does not also have to learn all the wrong theories that could explain the phenomena of the world or the reason for living organisms functioning in a certain way. Knowledge in this sense is a narrowing in that it rules out errors that would waste time and effort were one to pursue them. Thus education in addition to learning truth, excludes errors. The truth is singular; error, on the other hand is multiform. One needs only to know things as they really are.

While it may seem sheer common sense to say that learning crowds out error in any given branch of learning, this is a whole lot less obvious when applied to moral and religious knowledge. This is because so many people facilely believe that religious and moral truth is not absolute, as if there was no certainty possible in these areas. But the same God who created the universe in a very orderly–and therefore very knowable–fashion, also revealed religious truth and of what constitutes right conduct and sinful conduct. The significance of this point is not only that God alone is the source and author of all true things (whether of science and math, or religion and morals), but that once one knows, once one grasps the truths of faith and morality, one must not then go on in a vain search for other possible ways. When finds truth, he abandons further search. If, for example, one knows the truth of the Catholic faith, he need not investigate other possibilities. Or, if honesty, purity, and truthfulness are right, then one does not have to test the ways of deceit, impurity and falsehood. Possession of truth ends the search.

One might interrupt at this point to make an objection. There’s a difference, one might say, between scientific or mathematical knowledge on the one hand and religious or moral knowledge on the other, because the first kind of knowledge can be proved by experiment, the second can’t be proved in the same way. While this is obvious, it by no means negates the absolute reliability of religious and moral truth, but it does point to a problem about human knowing generally (and particularly about knowing religion). God revealed all truth, but that doesn’t mean that it’s easily known. The human intelligence suffered heavily through the fall of our first parents. This means that, as you know so well from your own experience, we don’t just come to know things automatically: we have to be taught–even the most gifted among us. Our knowledge of secular subjects has increased greatly over the knowledge we formerly had of the world. But in the areas of faith and morals, the human race was given all that it needed to know long ago; and these truths never change. Yet when they are imparted to each person, there has to be not just knowing them but also a willing acceptance of them. The fall affected not only our minds, but also our wills. This weakness of the will is gives us an inclination towards sinful things. We then not only need to know what is right, but desire to do what is right. That requires integrity and good moral habits acquired in youth and practiced over a long period of time.

This brings us to the subject of home education (home schooling) and the graduation you are witnessing today. You have been home schooled because your parents have made a determination that the traditional schools are not doing well in both departments of learning: they are not succeeding well academically and they are sowing seeds of confusion about religious and truth. With the built-in weakness of mind and inclination towards sin that you already have by your fallen nature, you don’t need any further encouragement to doubt or to sin.

Your graduation today signals a moment of transition when your parents’ efforts to build you up and prepare you to face the hard realities of a fallen world are being put to the test. Whether in college or in the business or social world, all that you have been led to know and practice thus far will be subject to a huge testing. Will you survive and keep your Catholic faith and your integrity, purity, and wholesomeness intact? We’ll know in a short time. The lesson of this sermon is to be on guard. Your weakness of mind means that you can be easily swayed to embrace false religion and your inclination to sin means that you can be easily led into sin that may spoil the rest of your lives. Wouldn’t it be a pitiful thing, a truly tragic thing, if after all the effort your parents, your church, priests, family and friends have pumped into you to be good Catholic adults, you turned out morally and spiritually rotten? I don’t mean to make it seem that you are now al that good or holy, nor do I mean to say that all non-home schoolers are corrupted. But it means that you have been blessed with an advantage that ought to make you a better Christian, a better person, a better American citizen.

Guard your faith and your moral life. Build yourselves up in truth and narrow down, reject, the many errors that will certainly be set before you. In this way, you will be truly make progress and be successful, no matter what else may transpire in your life. I pray in this Mass for the preservation of your faith and for the attainment of a virtuous and holy life for all of you. There is nothing greater, nothing nobler than to achieve these things.