August 26, 2024 // Perspective

New Beginnings, and Looking Forward to the End

Father Mark Hellinger

Going around the classrooms on the first day of school provided many entertaining moments, as the joy (mostly for the younger grades) and the mild dread (mainly in the older grades) showed through as summer was definitively over for the students and they were back in school.

One such moment left me thinking. Asking the first graders what they looked forward to the most about the year, I was caught off guard when one of them blurted out, “The picnic on the last day of school!”

I doubt the student realized it, but that response actually
provides some ground for reflection about the undertaking of new tasks – and the undertaking of the Christian task of holiness in this world. The student’s answer was distinct from others I had heard on the first day. Several students had responded that they were “looking forward to the year being over” (a not-surprising desire for a grade schooler ruthlessly ripped out of their summer mode). But this first grader had not just the end in mind but a celebration.

It is one thing to want something to be over; it is another to look forward to the delight and communal sharing in the job (well) done. Now, again, I doubt this first grader was really thinking this deeply about these things, but it really does point us in a profound direction. (We would do well to remember Matthew 21:16, when Jesus said, “Have you never read the text, ‘Out of the mouths of infants and nurslings you have brought forth praise’?”)

The human person delights in the good – especially the good that is achieved through some sort of struggle or sacrifice. Just think of the artist stepping back and appreciating a beautiful work of art he or she just produced, or, since the Olympics are now over, an athlete who breaks a record and performs well. The delight is proportional to the time put in and the sacrifice needed for perfection.

Thus, the desire of the first grader to celebrate the end of the school year with the annual picnic articulates an implicit understanding of the goal of a school year – and indeed the goal of any task we undertake. The opportunity to rest in the task completed anticipates the energy that will go into the attempt – and the joy of that rest will be proportional to the investment of the person. In that way, a poor attempt will result in a celebration that lacks any satisfaction, and a valiant attempt will result in a joyful celebration (even if it’s just sharing hot dogs).

I think we do well to reflect deeply on the wisdom of this first grader, especially as many of us are affected by the beginning of another school year (parents, grandparents, teachers, students, parishes, etc.). The joy of completion is proportional to the energy and sacrifice we pour into our tasks. This, of course, doesn’t require perfection in the outcome (it’s helpful to remember G.K. Chesterton’s quip – though admittedly taken out of context – that if a thing is worth doing, it’s worth doing badly).

Something even more profound is at work in this reflection, however, because we can easily recall – as we are reminded at every Mass – that the goal of our lives is a celebratory feast (“Blessed are those called to the supper of the Lamb”). More important than any celebration of the end of the school year, or the end of a fiscal year, or even the end of a career of labor, is the wedding feast to which we are all called with God in eternity. Do I look forward to it with the anticipatory joy of a first grader? Do I assess my sacrifices and time dedicated to activities in light of that wedding feast as my true goal?

Beginnings are always exciting, and they help us reset our priorities and commitments to reflect where we want our lives to be heading and how we value the things of this world and eternity. Knowing that some of our happiest moments come from the completion of tasks that require commitments, sacrifice, and energy (really, that require all of the things that make life meaningful), we do well at this new beginning to ask how we are preparing for the only celebratory meal that ultimately matters, when the final exam is given and each is given the eternal grade.

As St. Robert Bellarmine reminds us: “The school of Christ is the school of charity. On the last day, when the general examination takes place, there will be no question at all on the text of Aristotle, the aphorisms of Hippocrates, or the paragraphs of Justinian. Charity will be the whole syllabus.”

Father Mark Hellinger is Parochial Vicar at St. John the Baptist Church in Fort Wayne.