Baccalaureate Benediction - Kurt Nelson

A prayer especially for graduates:

You have been told for four years,

that you’re the best and the brightest.

You’ve been told countless times that "the world’s troubles are your troubles."

And if - by the end of this weekend -

you can count the number of times you've been told to,

"Go out and change the world,"

I'll be surprised. 

But I might humbly suggest,

in the midst of the whirlwind that is this weekend,

that you take a moment to Pause,

and let your blessings catch up with you.*

Commencement Prayer 2011 (Pentecost)

Commencement
June 12, 2011
Richard R. Crocker, College Chaplain

This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!

On this Pentecost day, we remember the promise:
Your sons and daughters shall prophecy. Old men and women shall dream dreams; young men and women shall see visions.

Today old ones – parents, grandparents, great grandparents, in body and in spirit - see their dreams realized.

Today young ones – our students, our sons and daughters, our grandsons and granddaughters - see visions.

We are all full of hope and gratitude.
May God’s spirit rest upon us all, enabling us to listen to the groaning of a fragile, endangered, and violent world, and enabling us to speak with voices of compassion that all can understand.

May the dreams of the old and the visions of the young lead us to a world of justice, mercy, and peace.

Amen.