Thacher Memorial Service | June 11, 2017

Delivered by Reverand D. Andrew Kille CdeP 1967
The great Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel opened his 1966 novel, The Gates of the Forest, with these words:

When the great Rabbi Israel Baal Shem-Tov saw misfortune threatening the Jews it was his custom to go into a certain part of the forest to meditate. There he would light a fire, say a special prayer, and the miracle would be accomplished and the misfortune averted.

Later, when his disciple, the celebrated Magid of Mezritch, had occasion, for the same reason, to intercede with heaven, he would go to the same place in the forest and say: “Master of the Universe, listen!: I do not know how to light the fire, but I am still able to say the prayer.” And again the miracle would be accomplished.

Still later, Rabbi Moshe-Lieb of Sasov, in order to save his people once more, would go into the forest and say: “I do not know how to light the fire, I do not know the prayer, but I know the place and this must be sufficient.” It was sufficient and the miracle was accomplished.

Then it fell to Rabbi Israel of Rizhyn to overcome misfortune. Sitting in his armchair, his head in his hands, he spoke to God: “I am unable to light the fire and I do not know the prayer; I cannot even find the place in the forest. All I can do is tell the story, and this must be sufficient.

And it was sufficient.1

Wiesel declares that God made human beings because God loves stories.

Sacredness. Of place, of rituals like lighting the fire, of speaking special words at special times—these have been the markers of our species’ effort to relate to the mystery that we all know goes far beyond what we can grasp or explain. And even when all these fail us, story remains.

The Memorial service is traditionally the last event of the alumni weekend, and so we make our way once again up the trail to this spot, to this vista of the Ojai Valley, and remember to remember. This is but one place among many that may be precious to us; climbing the hill and sharing names of the departed could be the rituals to shape our remembrance; the prayers may or may not be meaningful to us.

And yet, even if we cannot return to this place; even if the rituals and rhythms of life here at Thacher are fading, if not from our hearts, at least from our memories; even if we do not know how to pray or do not even feel the need to do so, still we all carry the story.

Although this gathering is dubbed the Memorial Service, this has already been a weekend of memorial—calling up the echoes of our days at this school, summoning the companions of our younger days, re-creating worlds with our words—all shared in the stories we tell.

Stories are not just stories—they are the way we order our experience, make sense out of our lives, carry forward what has been into what can yet become. Our stories are how we connect to each other—how we share our understandings, our insights, our values and hopes.

British literary scholar Barbara Hardy tells us that "we dream in narrative, daydream in narrative, remember, anticipate, hope, despair, believe, doubt, plan, revise, criticize, construct, gossip, learn, hate and love by narrative.”2 There is no part of our days that does not rub up against the story.

Some of our stories of life here at Thacher have become familiar—we remember them well, we tell them often, we delight in sharing them with our classmates and others. Other stories are more subtle—we find them rising from some unknown place as we walk across the campus; we hear them told differently through the eyes of another; we realize there is a lump in our throat or tears in our eyes as we encounter some new or long-forgotten movement in our souls too deep for words.

Honor. Fairness. Kindness. Truth. We've mentioned these words often during this weekend. They are fundamental to life at Thacher, and yet they are not defined in a guidebook or agenda. Definitions change as contexts change, and “time makes ancient good uncouth.” Such values are communicated from generation to generation best in the living stories that illustrate and evoke and reinforce those deep human aspirations and offer us hints of what is still unfolding.

Consider for a moment what stories you have heard this weekend that remind you of honor and fairness and kindness and truth. What is it that lives in those stories that offers you meaning or hope? Where do you discover them in the stories you have told?

The story of Thacher is not one single story; each of us has a word in the telling of the ongoing, ever-emerging life of honor, fairness, kindness, and truth. It is made up of the stories we have learned, the stories we continue to create in our own lives, and the stories we leave to those who follow us.

Today we remember those whose hearts have ceased their restless tattoo. At some point, their life’s struggle was through, their telling of new stories came to an end. As we read those names, remember their stories. Remember how their lives have been woven together with our own. As long as we remember, and cherish, and tell those stories, they are still with us.

Whether we can remember the place in the forest, even if we cannot kindle the sacred fire, and even if we cannot remember the prayer, we can always tell the story. And it will be sufficient.

O mystery, you are alive; I feel you all around;
You are the fire in my soul, you are the holy sound.
You are all of life, it is to you that I sing--
Grant that I may feel you always in everything.
O Grant that I may feel you, always in everything.3

---

1 Elie Wiesal, The Gates of the Forest (New York: Avon Books, 1966).

2 Barbara Hardy, “Toward a Poetics of Fiction: An Approach through Narrative,” Novel 2 (1968), p. 5. Cited in Glenn R. Paauw, Saving the Bible from Ourselves (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Press), p. 106.

3 Paul Winter, Missa Gaia (1982).
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Notice of nondiscriminatory policy as to students: The Thacher School admits students of any race, color, national, and ethnic origin to all the rights, privileges, programs, and activities generally accorded or made available to students at the School. It does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national, and ethnic origin in administration of its educational policies, admission policies, scholarship and loan programs, and athletic and other School-administered programs.