Go into the gaps - Convocation, 2006

Smith College Convocation
September 6, 2006
John M. Greene Hall

Benediction delivered by Jennifer L. Walters, Dean of religious life


In her book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Annie Dillard, notes that the prophet Ezekiel “excoriates” those who whitewash reality, who tell lies instead of truth, who say “’Peace! And there is no peace.”

The prophet is equally harsh with those who are content with the lies they are told.

“You have not gone into the gaps” or “into the broken places” the prophet says. As Dr. Paul Farmer’s* example reminds us, it is in the gaps and broken places where hope, compassion, generosity, and a truth deeper than the facts can be found.

Most of us are at least a little bit afraid of the gaps and broken places. They threaten our feeling of being in control, competent, successful. Even adventurers have habits and take precautions. If the path is not safe, we like to imagine that we can make it so.

But, as Dillard, says, “The gaps are the thing.” When you go into the gap -- risking failure, your reputation, your sense of yourself, everything you’ve ever thought or believed -- you discover something about your limits, your capacities, and you learn what you might never learn by staying in safer territory.

So I borrow a bit from Dillard, as I make this evening’s benediction:

“Go up into the gaps and the broken places.
The gaps are the cliffs in the rock where you cower to see the back parts of God;
they are the fissures between mountains and cells the wind lances through,
the icy narrowing fjords splitting the cliffs of mystery.
Go up into the gaps.
If you can find them; they shift and vanish too.
. . .
Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn and unlock – more than a maple – a universe.

May this be how you spend this evening [afternoon], and tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon.” [end of quotation]

May you be blessed with courage, reason, and skill as you travel into the unknown this academic year. May you be blessed with companions who will challenge you to grow and those who will give you strength. And may you dance and play along the way.

May it be so.


*Tracy Kidder's book about Farmer, Mountains Beyond Mountains, was assigned to this year's entering class. Kidder, Farmer, and Farmer's mother, Ginny, were guest lecturers the previous evening.