Law School Benediction (2021)
Let us bow our heads and pray.
You go now into a world that is in long recovery:
May you yourselves speed that recovery.
You go now into a world that deeply needs healing:
May you yourselves be sources of that healing.
You go now into a world that thirsts for justice and needs the rule of law:
May you yourselves promote justice and advance the rule of law in everything you do.
You go now into a world that longs for joy.
Remember, then, joy.
After a long winter of loss and languishing,
Remember joy.
The joy of active life.
The joy of touch … of families gathering … of smiles broadening without cover.
The joy of sharing space, of constructive citizenship, of common celebration.
The joy of working together, of the chance meeting over coffee.
The joy of grandparents sipping iced tea with their grandchildren on a Spring afternoon.
Remember joy.
Be joy.
Spread joy.
And may God bless you,
Who have always been the joy of your families.
And who shall ever be the joy of Fordham University.
Amen.