Fr. Glynn's bio page at John Carrol University's web site.
"Jesuit education provides a rigorous course of study based on the liberal arts. We seek to educate for vision, for hope, and for responsibility. We want our graduates to be haunted for the rest of their lives by the question that grows out of faith: how can I with my life, and with the people I work with, do the greater good, provide the greater service? How can I the promote justice for every person, no matter how racially or culturally or religoiusly or economically different?"
This homily below is available on the JSEA Forum
JSEA Colloquium
Rev. Edward Glynn, S.J.
John Carroll University
June 23, 2004
2 Kings 22:8-13, 23:1-3
Matt 7: 15-20
The characters that people the stories in Scripture are often so very unlike us that we find it difficult to identify or empathize with them. There is Jeremiah who walked around with a yoke upon his own neck. John the Baptist ate bugs. The king in today�s first reading is another example. He sends his priest, secretary and servant to �go inquire of the Lord for me and all of Judah� as to the meaning of the book that was found. In this setting: �Go inquire of the Lord� means to go and summon the prophet.
What was the king thinking? Really, what administrator ever welcomes much less seeks out the prophet, especially when there are so many wannabes eager to claim the role? The prophetic voice within our institutions can be the voice that is the most annoying, the one that evokes a collective sigh. It can be the voice that comes from the back of the room during every faculty meeting, the hand raised just when we thought the meeting was over, the insistent parent, the impertinent student, the undeterred teacher, the resolute board member. The prophetic voice comes from individuals who seem never to be satisfied. They always have yet another question to ask. And the answer is usually more work for us.
The reason that we frequently groan and roll our eyes when a prophetic voice is raised is because the prophets among us seem to ignore all the good we have done � the increase in enrollment, higher test scores, the successful capital campaign, the new building, the merit scholarships earned, the athletic titles won and the college placements. Prophets don�t give us a moment to relish and revel in all we have accomplished. What are laurels for, after all, if not to rest upon?
Prophets also are always the ones with questions. What was left undone? Have we done enough to promote and create real diversity in our school? Who are the have-nots within our own school community? What more can we do to increase financial aid, to reach out to the poor in the larger community? Are our assessments fair, our discipline just and equitable? Are we honestly able to serve those students with learning differences? Do the arts get attention equal to that of athletics? Is this the best curriculum that we can offer? Are these the best textbooks available? Is the pedagogy appropriate? Is this retreat program better than another? How does what we do and what we have accomplished serve the mission of the school? What else can we do to further advance the mission of the school?
Further advance? It takes time and energy just to maintain the status quo, especially when the status quo was established one, two or three generations back. Simply maintaining the status quo, however, can quickly become the first step in institutional decline and so we must learn how to include the prophetic voice in our institutional wide conversations, not simply for reasons of enlightened self interest -- keeping the doors open � but with a sincere desire to serve the greater good. The prophetic voice may be annoying but, fortunately, it is a constitutive part of Jesuit education. It is the desire to seek the magis. The prophetic voice is constitutive of Jesuit education because it is constitutive of the incarnational faith which grounds Ignatian spirituality. Because creation has been renewed and the human restored to the image of God everything within the bounds of creation are at the disposal of the one seeking to better serve the God who has so redeemed us. Our faith in the Incarnate God tells us that �it is never a question of choosing either God or the world; rather it is always [the question of choosing] God in the world, laboring to bring...[the world] to perfection so that the world comes, finally, to be fully in God,� to be fully in the God who is irrevocably bound to us through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. The Spirit that breathed life into the Crucified Christ is the same spirit that makes all things new, that is the source of all that is creative, innovative and generative and is the source of all that advances a more just and more humane world. When we live lives of communion with God�s presence and action laboring and working in history, we share in the possibility of creativity, innovation and generativity. We participate in the life of the living God working and laboring in history when we search for a new and better way to build the Kingdom where we are out of who we are and what we have. Those voices that summon us to strive toward the greater good, that call us back to the gospel, that remind us here and now of our responsibilities, that pry us away from the parochial are indeed prophetic.
Matthew�s gospel cautions us: �Beware of prophets, who come to you in sheep�s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.� The Gospel tells us that we will know them by their fruits � sound tree, good fruit; bad tree, evil fruit. Most of us however are never presented with a clear cut choice between good and evil. Rather we are asked to choose among various goods. So how do we determine which good among many is the best?
In the Spiritual Exercises Ignatius Loyola gives us a standard of measure. The good fruit is that which draws us deeper into the life of Christ. Christ, Crucified and Risen, the symbol and sacrament of a God irrevocably bound to the poor, the marginalized, the voiceless and the oppressed, is not a pious platitude but a genuine criterion which we can employ when choosing among goods. Choosing that good which better conforms to Christ is choosing that which server the greater need and so the greater good.
Ignatius never separated the educational enterprise from his first desire to meet the Incarnate God in the world by providing the greatest service to those in greatest need. He never separated it from his first desire to help souls. And so he and his company embarked on a mission that drew them deeper into cultural engagement, deeper into the intellectual life, deeper into the complexities, conflicts and challenges of their time and place in search of the greater need, to offer the greater service.
The magis then is not institutional advancement for itself. The rich endowment, high SAT scores, the rigorous curriculum, the successful student, the accomplished teacher, the committed staff member, the effective administrator, the conscientious board member are all not ends in themselves, at least not in a school that strives to fulfill it�s Jesuit character. The positive strides and efforts of a school community are Jesuit when they are aimed toward greater service of Christ. Ignatius writes that we �should not bury in the earth the gifts and graces God continually imparts to us.� We should indeed strive for excellence, personal, professional and institutional. And, if we listen to the truly prophetic voices in our schools, we will know that our excellence and our achievements are measured only against the service we can provide for the greater glory of God.