Bishop's Statements

Graduate Commencement Address, Santa Clara University
June 17, 2001

Good morning.

First, I congratulate all of you on the 150th anniversary of the founding of this great university. Your sesquicentennial in this valley is a testament to the contributions of the Society of Jesus to the history and growth of this area.

Just two years after the Gold Rush, before this valley became known for its orchards, and long before silicon was even dreamed of, the Jesuits journeyed here and established a notable presence that has had a great influence on who and what we are today. Perhaps overlooked by the population explosion of the recent past, this anniversary serves as a reminder to all in the Santa Clara Valley of the great debt of gratitude that we owe to the Jesuit community.

Second, I thank the University’s Board of Trustees for the honorary degree that they confer on me today. This is my first honorary degree though there are some who would like to argue that my Canon Law degree was also honorary. I emphatically deny that. This Diocese of San Jose is only twenty years old. Yet, in our short history, the support and help of this university and of the larger Jesuit community have been immensely beneficial. I accept this honor from you as one way of celebrating our valued relationship. Thank you!

Third, I address myself to those of you on whom post-graduate degrees are being conferred today. Congratulations! You thought the hard work was all behind you! And then you arrive here to hear that work is just about to commence. Wow! That is another of the surprises of life! And you thought you knew all of the “facts of life.” There are many more like that in store … believe me.

You represent a wide variety of graduate studies, backgrounds, beliefs and interests. This makes you an audience that is a speaker’s nightmare. It is difficult to discern a common reference point or language system or cultural horizon to address. The only common element is your cap and gown and this university where we gather. And so I, wise person that I am, chose that as my starting point.

The strategic vision and hope of Santa Clara University is that you leave here with the strengths of Competence, Conscience and Compassion. The three great “C”s. These are the three noble virtues that the university hopes that you are armed with today. I choose to reflect on them as you commence to leave here and to continue to refine and shape the work-in-progress which each of us is.

Competence. The dictionary defines this as “the quality of having suitable or sufficient skill, knowledge, experience for a given purpose.” The purposes here vary from Engineering to Business to Counseling to the arts of pastoral service. The degrees granted today verify a certain level of mastery of the accumulated academic backgrounds in each of your areas. The presumption is that you are competent. Yes, really, I swear I am not kidding!

The dictionary, however, does not mention “humility” or “docility” in terms of competence. They are, I believe, two important qualities, among others, which will separate your future work from being merely competent to being exceptional and brilliant.

In other words, you leave here with a freshly minted degree, but that does not mean that your learning curve has peaked. You still have much to learn in the specific worlds of applications. A good sprinkle of the salt of humility and docility on the careers to which you are about to embark can work marvels.

As an example, I speak to the smallest segment of you graduates, those receiving degrees in Pastoral Ministry, but the ones whose future work I know the best. (To the rest of you, some of this, I believe, will also apply.)

My predecessor, Pierre DuMaine, asked Santa Clara University to develop this program because of our felt need for educated pastoral ministers to serve in our parishes and service organizations. The Diocese of San Jose is very grateful to the university for its positive response to that request and for this very fine program.

You, who are graduating from this particular program will bring a wonderful wealth of knowledge, skill and experience to your future areas of service. Humility and docility, however, will serve you well. The positions you take are, generally, not as new as your parchments. There is much to be learned from on-the-job training and the wisdom of those who have gone before you. An openness to that knowledge will stand you in good stead. That is one of the keys that opens the door between “competent” and “exceptional,” and there is such a door, I believe, in every graduate’s future.

Conscience, the second noble virtue that Santa Clara hopes to have engendered in you, is that inner sense of what is right or wrong in your conduct or motives. Conscience is that tiny voice, that Jiminy Cricket voice, that impels you to right action, to right living.

Right action takes many different shapes depending on your position in life. Awareness of conscience and the values that help you choose right from wrong has, we hope, been encouraged here. But conscience formation is an on-going task as is the task of continuing to listen and heed your conscience.

Whether you work in engineering or business or counseling or whatever, almost every major choice you make has implications that can be right or wrong based on your beliefs and values. The hope is that your time here has helped attune your inner ear to hearing that voice of conscience and responding courageously to it. The hope is that you have shaped your beliefs and values in such a way that they will foster a robust conscience to guide your choices. This has a price, and it will not always make you popular. But popularity is not the goal. The goal is right living. Be courageous. Take risks for what is right.

Contemporary movies and literature attack business and government for shrunken consciences that value short-term profit and self-centered gain over the needs of the many and the good of the planet. May the conscience awareness and formation you have begun here continue to blossom. May your motives, conduct, and actions always be shaped by other-centered beliefs and values.

The final virtue that this university hopes that you leave with is Compassion. Compassion is a “feeling of deep sympathy and sorrow for another person who is struck by misfortune and the accompanying desire to alleviate that suffering”. In short, compassion is to be merciful. A virtue our world really needs.

As a strength to be found notable in graduates, compassion is, we like to believe, a particularly Catholic and Jesuit value. Many of you do not share our religious belief. But the hope in engaging in an enterprise like maintaining a Santa Clara University is that we can encourage sharing with others a value, such as compassion, that is so central to our belief.

To feel sympathy with others who are suffering and to seek to alleviate that misfortune is a noble strength indeed. Not only does it shape your conscientious decisions in your future jobs, but it also shapes who you are and what you do. And so I say to you, “Be known for your compassion, your mercifulness.” Be aware of those who are less fortunate than you. Think of those with no roof over their heads or food for their stomachs. Think of those in prison or strangers in a foreign land. Think of those with minds and bodies too weak to move. Think of others. Value persons above things, relationships above possessions, service of others above power and status. And if you gain the courage to live and yes, to die for the right things, then, my friends, periodically you will discover an incredible happiness here and now. Think of other people when you make your work decisions in the future. Then you can boast of being a Santa Clara success.

Competence, Conscience, Compassion are the hoped for virtues of a graduate from Santa Clara University. May your lives, as they progress, give flesh to that hope. And now it is time to leave. Time for some parting advice. Neither an optimist nor a pessimist be. One who always sees the glass half full or half empty. Instead, be like the engineers to whom the glass is just twice as big as it needs to be. Those of you who are from this valley, I hope that you have a place to live. Remember, your parents have already rented out your room.

More seriously: If it is none of your business, don’t ask questions. If it will brighten someone’s day, say it. If it will tarnish someone’s reputation, then keep it to yourself.

Congratulations on your success thus far. I wish you all that you would wish yourselves: life, health, and happiness. May this be your motto … “You only live once, but if you work it right, once is enough.”

God speed and again, congratulations!