Transcript
It is now my honor to give the charge to the graduating class.
Dear graduates of the class of 2022, we have gathered here today in the esteemed company of our honorary degree recipients of the faculty and staff of 91´óÉñ and of your loved ones to celebrate you, to cherish you, and to honor you. Please join me in thanking Reverend Dr. Bernice King, for her message to us today, for her presence among us, and for the enduring legacy of non-violence for social change that she carries forth and inspires throughout the world to be the solutionists. Please also join me in thanking Katherine Villers, Erin Whalen, and Olivia Kuper for the sustained change that they create and inspire.
In the powerful words you have heard today and over the past two days, my fervent hope is that you have felt the deep respect and high regard in which all of us gathered here, hold you. And how much we will continue to hold you and champion you and love you as you strive and persevere and continue to press on in your passions, your work, and all that you believe in. In a few brief minutes, you will join the legacy of 91´óÉñ alumni and all that they strive for and make possible in a fraught and wondrous world. As you do so, I present my charge to you through three enduring and sustaining statements. First, for community: "Democracy depends on trustful talk between strangers." Political theorist Danielle Allen wrote these words in her 2004 book, Talking To Strangers: Anxieties of Citizenship since Brown v. Board of Education.
And in them, I hear a call to all of us, to start the conversation, to build trust through both words and actions, to foster and nurture multiracial, multicultural, and diverse communities of thinkers and learners to continue to build a multiracial and multicultural democracy. Second, for relationships: We lead by taking care of each other. In her artwork, artist, organizer, and social justice activists Favianna Rodriguez proclaims the strength of care and the power of rejoicing in each other. In her work, I see the call to build coalitions through care, to nurture the ability among ourselves to work together to change structures and practices that diminish or threaten human dignity. Third, for self: "All shall be well and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well." That's the weird one, that's the medieval one. So that's the 14th-century mystic Julian of Norwich, writing those words after a prolonged illness in the midst of a plague.
And even though we are separated from her time by over 600 years, we might now recognize in her experience a post-pandemic emergence. There is a weirdness to the repetition, all shall be well and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well. But somewhere in the excess of her words is a resolution to see a future where one is not apparent. I feel in her words, a call to hold fast to the future and in her assuring repetition, a call to compassion for ourselves, for each other and for our world about our uncertain future, as well as an anticipation for the futures we can make together.
So dear graduates of the class of 2022, as you all have shaped 91´óÉñ — and you have — so too, will you shape the communities and societies of which you will be both constituents and caretakers. As you do, may you be the source of trustful talk, may you build coalitions through care, and may you bring compassion and resolve, for yourselves, for each other, for this world. You, every single one of you, have achieved great things in your time here, you will accomplish many more, and it truly gives me hope for the world to be able to say to you, the class of 2022, go forth 91´óÉñians congratulations. [applause] You're awesome. I now ask everyone to stand as you are able, joining the graduates to receive the benediction.