Baccalaureate Homily 2026
Love One Another
It was
an average Sunday morning outside of Harvest Bible Chapel, an Illinois
Protestant megachurch, except one thing was awry: there was a homeless man
sitting, begging on the steps leading up to the church.
Some
Church members gave him food or drink or money, some stopped to chat, and some
walked right by. Many tried to avoid eye contact, unsure of his mental state or
any drug problems that might launch him into bizarre behavior. He certainly
looked disheveled – long scraggly beard, unkempt hair, filthy clothes, shopping
cart overflowing with the detritus of his existence.
But when
the time came for the service, the congregants were surprised to see the
homeless man wheeling his shopping cart down the main aisle of the church. The
homeless man stepped into the sanctuary, took off his hat and filthy coat…and
then took off his hair and beard. Gasps arose from the congregation as they saw
that homeless man transform into their pastor, James MacDonald. He then began
to preach the message: “If we are going to love like our Father in Heaven
loves, we don't get to play favorites. By favorites I mean, so often we love
the people when there is some benefit in it for us. It’s hardest to love when
the people are least known.”
My
friends, we have taught you a great deal of things in your tenure at CKA – some
of you have been here for six years. But if we have not taught you to love,
then we have utterly failed in our mission. Not just to love those who are in
our same political party, or who have the same skin color, or the same
religion, or the same intelligence level, or the same abilities, or the same
sexual orientation. I don’t recall Jesus’ command to “love one another” to have
exceptions – it includes those people you don’t like, or sinners, or those who
are different. Because Christ died for them too.
Over the
past couple weeks, based on events at CKA, I have been thinking a lot about
love. Unfortunately our world has co-opted that word to mean “tolerance” (no,
not the same thing as love) or “warm-fuzzy emotion” (also not love). We don’t
have to feel anything toward our neighbor to love them. We don’t have to
approve of their lifestyle, their choices, their hairstyle. We don’t have to
become best friends with them. But we do have to treat them with respect, meet
their needs, and even die for them. Remember, you were pretty unlovable when
Christ died for you.
Is this
appropriate for a graduation homily? I think it’s most appropriate. Because I
don’t give a whit whether you were accepted to Yale or UConn or Hillsdale. I
don’t care if you become a CEO or win the Nobel Peace Prize or make
All-American in soccer. I don’t care about any of that, and I don’t think
Christ does, either. As St. John of the Cross once said, “In the evening of
life we will be judged on love alone.”
Tomorrow
morning, I have the incredible blessing of helping at a retreat at the Sisters
of Life in Stamford for young people with Downs’ Syndrome and their parents. I
can tell you that there will be some truly great souls there – men and women
who have accepted their Crosses and still radiate joy. Some of them will be far
closer to sanctity than you and me. The world says hide them away, exterminate
them, for they remind mankind of our fundamental weakness…and because they
demand authentic, self-sacrificing love, which the world recoils from.
But this
virtue of charity is precisely what sets Christians – and hopefully CKA
graduates – apart from the world. The early Church suffered three centuries of persecutions
of the most gruesome kind. Thrown to the lions, crucified upside-down, skinned
alive. But the Christian movement continued to grow. Why? Because Christians
loved those whom everyone else rejected. They rescued abandoned and disabled
babies. They gave dignity to the poor and to women. When the plague struck the
city of Rome, the aristocrats left town, while the Christians remained to care
for the victims. Although many of them caught the plague themselves and died,
so many others were inspired by their example that they rushed to join this
maligned movement. Love was rare in the world back then; it is perhaps even
more rare in the world now.
Imagine
how many students our school would have if we loved one another! Imagine the
force we would be for good! It’s not too late – and with God’s grace, our lives
going forward can be transformed into love.
I close
with the famous story of St. John the Apostle. Exiled on the island of Patmos,
he would gather the nascent Christian community every Sunday for Mass and
preaching. All would draw near to hear the trembling voice of the Apostle.
Sunday after Sunday, he would repeat the same words, “Little children, love one
another! Love one another!”
Finally
he was asked, “Why do you repeat this phrase so much?”
John
replied, “Because the Master said it so much.”
My
friends, we cannot love the God we cannot see unless we first love the brother
whom we do see. It’s not too late to become students and scholars where love is
united to truth. Without love, all our life’s successes are completely
empty and vapid. But even the failures and sorrows, crosses and struggles of
the future will be turned into joy if they become an act of love towards God
and neighbor.
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