Excerpt from remarks shared at the 38th annual Bishop McNulty Award Dinner Dance (11/19/10):

Once there was a king was traveling with his child and his whole entourage through the wilderness. Suddenly the procession came to a halt because the king’s son was crying for water. So the king ordered his royal engineering corps to dig a well right there, on the spot at which they had stopped. Soon the royal engineers were boring a hole through the desert sand and rock. Toward evening they reached a vein of water, and the prince’s thirst was quenched.

After he had drunk his fill, the prince asked his father, “Why did you trouble your men to dig a hole in the desert? After all, you could have obtained water much more quickly and easily by sending men by horseback to the nearest settlement.”

“Good question, my son. Perhaps one day, many years in the future, you will be traveling this way again. Perhaps you will be alone, without all the power and privilege you now enjoy. Then, the well we dug today will be here to quench your thirst.”

“But father, in many years the sands of time will have filled up the well and erased its very memory!”

“Indeed, you have spoken with wisdom, my son. So, we will mark the site of this well on our maps, and we will set up a tall signpost here. If you know the exact spot at which this well has been sunk, you will be able to reopen it easily when you pass this way again. This we shall do at every encampment on our journey. We shall dig wells, mark the spot and mark their places on our map. So whenever, and under whatever circumstances, you travel this route again, you will be able to find water to sustain you on your journey.”

Tonight and other days or moments throughout our year are like wells, resting places along the way, wells sunk by those who have come before us, places where we pause to drink deep and refresh ourselves. The people who have received awards this evening – the adults, the youth, Lana Benatovich – they are the signposts – they signify the presence of a living well providing waters of faith and service that sustain us. It is good to recognize and thank these people for the ways that they share faith and serve others. It is refreshing to hear this good news and be reminded that there is good that comes from our work.

Yet, we arrive at this refreshing well in the midst of turmoil. The situations we face, from the political climate to the economy, from pain and brokenness in families to youth who are hurting themselves or others, the overall condition of our world just feels so sad, so overwhelming. Some of us may feel a sense of helplessness in the face of the present day situation of our world. We share a sense of pessimism – some may have sunk so low in their outlook on the world that they feel there is no hope.

But people of religious faith are called to hope, because hope is intimately connected to what it means to have faith in something bigger than and beyond ourselves. People of faith can’t bury our heads in the sand and ignore the problems of the world, and we can’t just stand on the side, wringing our hands and whining or complaining about the state of the world. We are called to an active hope. At times of pain and despondency, it is our undying sense of hope that gives us the courage to move forward.

But how do we find hope when the challenges feel overwhelming? While hope is a gift from God, I think there are three things we must do to work in partnership with God.

First, we need to ward off despair and create a safe space for the seeds of hope to be planted. We can do this by focusing on the here and now, focus on each and every day. By spending less energy being anxious and worried about the future, we can be more attentive to the gifts in each present moment. Yes, I know many of you who are students are worried about where you’ll go to college, when you’ll find true love, or what your future will hold. I know that we adults have our share of anxieties about the future too. We are all challenged to shift our attention out of the future and bring it back to the present. In the present moment, we so often naturally discover the answers to those questions that cause us such anxiety.

Second, once we have that space, we need plant those seeds of hope. In a place where there seems to be no upstanding human beings, stand up and be human. We have to stand up for what is right, even in places where no one else is courageous enough to do so. There was a group of high school kids sitting together eating pizza. One group of older teens were criticizing the younger students. “Can you believe his haircut? He looks ridiculous!” “Can you believe her shoes? Who does she think she is?!” As the conversation went on and on, one of the students looked more and more uncomfortable. Finally she spoke up. “You guys,” she said. “It’s just not nice. Gossiping is wrong! Let’s talk about something else.” A hopeful moment, a moment of planting a seed of hope. In a place where no one else was brave enough, she stood up to be a human being. We create hope through purposeful action, standing up for what is right, for the core values that our religious faith would have us live in our lives and in our world.

And finally, we must maintain hope, and feed it, water it, and keep the weeds away so that it can grow. We do this by staying connected to our faith communities. We belong to many communities – our schools, our clubs or sports teams, even communities at our jobs. But our faith communities provide us with something different. Our faith communities are not simply social communities. Our faith communities are places where we are asked to offer our talents in service to others, and places where we can let down our guard and be supported, trusting that our mutual commitment to the values of our tradition will protect us from the cruelty which is all too prevalent around us. Faith communities are communities of meaning which can bring hope and maintain hope in our lives.

So let us hold out for hope, doing these three things.
• Create space for hope. Focus on the here and now.
• Plant seeds of hope. In a place where there are no upstanding human beings, stand up and be human.
• Maintain the tender shoots of growing hope. Do not separate yourself from your community. We share hope by actively connecting ourselves to our religious community.

If we do these three things, we all can be signposts of a deep well of living, refreshing hope for others.