Worship

Sermon Archive

Saturday June 12, 2010
11:00 am - Saint Thomas Church
Preacher: The Reverend Daniel R. Heischman, National Association of Episcopal Schools

Is it Changed, or Have I Changed?

At the age of fifty, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow returned to his home town of Portland, Maine. It was a puzzling experience for him, and while there, he wrote a poem called, “Changed,” and these are the opening stanzas:

From the outskirts of the town,
Where of old the mile-stone stood,
Now a stranger, looking down,
I behold the shadowy crown
Of the dark and haunted wood.

Is it changed, or am I changed?
Ah! The oaks are fresh and green,
But the friends with whom I ranged
Through their thickets are estranged
By the years that intervene.

Has it changed, or have I changed?

In the last two years that I served as chaplain of Trinity School, here in New York on the Upper West Side, I moved my office from the Upper School to the Lower School. From time to time students from the Upper School, many of whom had spent their entire school years at Trinity, would stop by to chat, and in the process they passed by some of the old classrooms they inhabited during their years in the Lower School. Some found that experience a happy one, others found it, like Longfellow, a puzzling one. Quite often I heard many of them say, in one way or another, “I went into my fourth grade class just now, and, you know, it seems much smaller to me now than what I remember of it as a fourth grader.” I recall one student then wondering, “Is that because I am bigger now?” Has it changed, or have I changed?

So, too, after living in New York City for a number of years, my nephew came to visit for the first time. It was in the mid-80’s, tough years for New York City, with lots of homeless people on the streets asking for money and attempting to find warm places to sleep at night. After spending a day in the city, I could tell that he was unsettled and bothered by something. When I asked him, he told me that he had not expected to see so many poor or disenfranchised people sleeping on the streets, and he himself had not slept the night before, thinking about all of them. I realized that he had seen things, for the first time, which apparently I had grown immune to, that I had simply stopped noticing. And what did that say about how I had changed, and what happens when you are in a place for a period of time and what you choose to pay attention to and what not to pay attention to? Had the city become more impoverished, I wondered, or had I become more callous? Had it changed, or had I changed?

Those of you graduating from the Choir School are right in the midst of change – a big change. It may turn out to be one of the biggest changes of your life. To be sure, a Choir School such as St. Thomas lives with change all of the time – now that may sound strange to say, in a place that honors tradition, routine, and history as much as this wonderful institution does. But any choir school lives with the one big, anticipated, certain, but nevertheless surprising change – the change of voices in the boys who sing. For some of you, that happened some time ago, for others, it may still be on the way. But just as change is etched into the fabric of our everyday lives, so change is very much a part of the rule of life and rhythm of a choir school.

But there is more change among you than the change of voice. There is change of interest, or perhaps it is better to say when new worlds have opened up to you. I suspect some of you recall moments during your time here when, at one and the same time, you saw or heard or read something new, but it was as if you had come home, had been brought to a place that was waiting for you all of this time. Such was the case for me when I heard a live orchestra for the first time – I had never been part of such an experience, but it was as if I had been waiting for it all of my life. Or when someone or something – a teacher, another student, or an idea – challenged you to think about yourself and what you value in a way you had never thought before. Or that moment on the soccer field, or in the art studio, when you realized you had a talent that you never knew you possessed.

I would guess, however, that the biggest type of change you have experienced has to do with the questions you have asked yourself. That, perhaps more than any other type of experience, is a true sign of the change that has taken place within you, not to mention a telling symbol of the influence the choir school has had upon you.

You may not realize that there was a point in your life when you were not asking questions the way you are now. Of course, as bright and inquisitive young men you have always been asking questions: I suspect not a few of the parents gathered here today remember those times in your earlier years when you posed questions that would leave even great theological experts tongue-tied. Questions like, “Who made God?” Or, “Where did I come from?” Or, “If mom is Catholic and dad is Jewish, what does that make me?” You have always been asking questions, and many of them will confound the wisest of adults.

But lately I suspect those questions have taken a different turn. More and more, those questions have to do with who you are and how you fit into the world around you. Questions like, “Am I a good person? Who can I trust? Who are my real friends? Why am I here? Is this right, or fair? Is anyone listening to me? Does anyone notice me? If I do not continue to be a part of this or that, will I be a quitter? Why did this happen to me? Should I say something about what I have just seen or heard? Do I really believe what I am singing, or praying, or hearing?” These are not only good questions, they are questions you are meant to be asking.

The parents of one of my students came into my office, many years ago. Their son was a superb student, and an outstanding, nationally ranked tennis player, a good and decent and personable young man. He was the envy of all of his friends. Yet he had confounded his parents the night before, at the dinner table, by asking them, as well as himself, the following question: “Am I really good at anything?”

His mom and dad nearly fell off their chairs when they heard this; “What do you mean?’ they asked him. And they promptly listed all of the areas in which he excelled. What I don’t think they understood, that evening, was that the question their son was asking of himself was a question that he needed to ask. Not that there was not a number of important answers, but that asking the question to himself was a part of the change, the growth, that takes place in every person’s life.

Longfellow’s question, “Is it changed, or am I changed?” an example of one of the most important things we do in life. We ask questions of ourselves, and the nature of the questions we ask of ourselves is as true a sign of changes in our lives as anything else. And some of those questions we ask of ourselves can be tough, perhaps even seemingly devastating questions, at times.

But here is where you have been truly blessed, I believe, by being in this place over the past years. You have been part of a community that is not afraid to ask questions of you – be it in the classroom, the playing field, the art studio. Your time here has not been one of spoonfeeding, it has been one of formation, and part of formation is the activity of asking you questions that it takes a while to answer. So, too, you have no doubt found here compassionate and caring adults who will sit with you when you ask the tough questions of yourself, and will not be unsettled by the nature of the questions you have asked nor rush to answer the questions for you. They know that you need time to find those answers. So, too, you have partaken, in a very big way, of a faith tradition that is not afraid of people asking questions. You have been asked to do many things, as you have made the walk, day after day, from the Choir School to this place. But one thing you have not been asked to do is to check your mind at the door of the church. This great tradition of ours is one not only of fine music, but of serious thinking about what we believe. We have answers to the great questions of life, but those answers are there for people to arrive at, not simply accept. Truly, you have been prepared in the art of asking questions in a way that few others in this world have, and that will go a long way toward sustaining you in the years ahead.

So, when the questions come, listen to them. Know, as well, that these questions are not enemies, but friends. They are a telling sign of the changes we all go through in life. By embracing the questions, you will have taken the first step to finding the answers. So, too, this school has helped you to build the foundation you will need for all of the changes, and their accompanying questions, that you will encounter in life. And when you ask, “Is it changed, or have I changed,” know that – just as with the big change you are experiencing this weekend – a new chapter in your life may well be opening, a chapter for which you are supremely prepared.

O let me hear thee speaking, in accents clear and still,
Above the storms of passion, the murmurs of self-will;
O speak to reassure me, to hasten or control;
O speak and make me listen, thou guardian of my soul.