A Man for All Seasons
Normally I wouldn't post a full speech. One of the heroes here, however, happens to be a man connected by marriage to the Ricochet community: Matthew Hennessey, husband of Ursula and father of three beautiful children: Clara, Magdalena, and Paddy.
St. Charles Prep
2012 Borromeo Lecture
November 16, 2011
Principal Cavello, faculty and staff, moms and dads, friends and alumni … most of all, the young men of St. Charles: It is an honor to be here.
I especially wish to thank Mr. Cavello. When Mr. Cavello invited me to speak, I asked him what I ought to speak about. He told me: “About 5 minutes.”
Your principal is a wise man. The Golden Rule is a sentence. The Gettysburg Address is 271 words. I may not match either in eloquence, but you will be relieved to know that I aspire to their brevity.
When I accepted his invitation, I was pleased to learn that St. Charles is a school for young men. I will speak more about that later. Here I will just note that I am the father of three girls. Some of you students may be asking yourselves, “What does that mean?” Let me tell you what it means:
It means I have a keen interest in the formation of young men. It is an interest, moreover, that grows stronger and stronger as my daughters advance through their teenage years.
One of the men who has come from your ranks is a good friend of mine: Bob Dilenschneider. Bob is a straight shooter, a man I can always count on to tell me the truth. That may not mean much to you today. Someday, I promise you, it will. Right now I’d like to ask you join me in thanking Bob for his great love for this school – and for the high bar his example sets for all Carolians.
How fitting that this place of learning is named for St. Charles. The name Charles means “manly” or “strong.” Manifestly that describes Charles Borromeo. He was a giant of the faith. In his own day, he was a bold and learned reformer who was even shot at by a disgruntled monk. Fortunately for history, the monk’s shooting skills were apparently as deficient as his theology.
Your website says St. Charles offers you students “the opportunity to grow in Christian manhood.” The handbook is quite specific about what it means by Christian manhood – “a personal relationship with God, accurate learning, and an ethic of disciplined work.”
Not many institutions make that kind of claim these days. Would that more did. And that is precisely what I wish to talk with you about today: What it means to be a man in 21st century America.
When people say someone is manly, what do they mean? Most answers boil down to this: A man is someone who will stand up for a principle he knows is right, as well as for people he sees are being picked on, even at great cost to himself. That does not mean he is without fear. Many a man’s most courageous moment has come when he’s been most afraid. A man is someone who does not let his fears conquer him.
Manliness is not boastful, but it speaks a language understood by all. If you are a man, even those who are stronger than you will sense it. Even when they have defeated you, they will feel inferior in your presence. In like wise, if you are a fellow who cannot be counted on, everyone will soon know that too. Worst of all, you will know it yourself.
Today I’d like to share two examples of manhood. One was a soldier who was awarded the Medal of Honor. The other is a young father who has a little girl with Down syndrome. Each faced a moment of truth, when the easier thing would have been to look out for Number One. Each had the character to put love over self. Each in his own way shows what it means to be a man.
The soldier’s name was Robert J. Miller. He was a sergeant in the Special Forces of the United States Army. In my time at the White House, I wrote several speeches commemorating men who were awarded the Medal of Honor. Sergeant Miller’s medal was bestowed by President Obama, so I did not write those remarks. In the last year, however, I have learned much about this American fighting man from his mother.
The Medal of Honor is our nation’s highest award for valor. It is given for actions “above and beyond the call of duty.” In other words, you cannot be awarded the Medal of Honor for something you were ordered to do, no matter how brave you might have been.
It tells you something about the Medal of Honor that seven of the ten men who have received it for their service in Iraq and Afghanistan were killed in the action that earned it. That’s what we mean by “the last full measure of devotion.” The United States bestows medals to acknowledge the extraordinary service and character of individuals who wear the uniform of our nation. Perhaps even more important, we give out medals to inspire the rest of us – to remind us what it means to take seriously words such as honor … and sacrifice … and courage.
In 2008, Sergeant Miller’s unit was patrolling the Kunar province in northeastern Afghanistan. Their job was to root out Taliban forces that prey on innocent Afghan civilians. That winter night, Sergeant Miller and his fellow soldiers attacked an enemy compound. When they moved in closer to inspect the damage, they were ambushed by a larger Taliban force.
Instinctively, Sergeant Miller did two things. First, he attacked with everything he had. Second, he had the presence of mind to communicate the enemy’s positions to the rest of his detachment so they could call in air support and better direct their fire. He did this even as he himself was returning fire.
As the battle unfolded, Sergeant Miller found himself further up the mountain and much closer to the enemy positions than the 22 other men with him – 15 Afghans and 7 Americans. When his wounded commander called for the unit to pull back, Sgt. Miller saw that these men would not get out of that valley alive because they were pinned down by a much larger Taliban force. His answer was to charge the enemy again, exposing himself and drawing their fire. In so doing, he knew it would likely cost him his life – but he also knew it was the only way to save the lives of his brothers in arms.
Let me tell you something else about this Green Beret: He was only 24 years old when he died.
There was a day when our nation made movies about men like Sergeant Miller. This was one tough hombre, who liked his Scotch and liked his fast cars. At the core of his toughness, however, was an even tougher love: his love of freedom … his love of his nation … his love of others more than himself. He walked those unknown valleys in Afghanistan to keep people like us safe. And when his brother soldiers needed him most, he did what John Chapter 15 tells us is the greatest of loves, to lay down his own life for his friends.
Sergeant Miller was also a Catholic boy, raised in what his mom tells me was a “home with a very clear sense of right and wrong.” I’m not saying he was a saint. In fact, his mom tells me her son wasn’t an easy child: He was willful, contrary, and sometimes reckless.
Mrs. Miller puts it this way: “When we first started learning some of what happened when he died, even then we were wondering if his actions were deliberate and courageous – or more recklessness. As we found out more about the training that Special Forces go through and some of the actions that he had never told us about, it began to sink in that he knew exactly what he was doing up until his final moments.”
In sum, Sergeant Miller was an individual whose manhood was forged in many fires: in the virtues nurtured by a loving home … in the disciplines instilled by the United States Special Forces … in the love of neighbor – the same chapter where Thomas Aquinas locates his treatment of warfare – rooted in his faith. When America was attacked on September 11, 2001, Robert Miller was a senior in high school. From the description Mrs. Miller gives me, he could have been any one of you St. Charles students here today.
Now, when I hear of stories like Sergeant Miller’s, my admiration leaves me feeling frustrated. The reason is simple: There is no way I can ever even the score. I can’t bring Sergeant Miller back to his family. I cannot even tell him “thank you.” What I can do is this: to resolve to live a life worthy of this good man’s sacrifice.
That is our challenge. And were he standing where I am today, Sergeant Miller would be the first to tell you that you don’t have to wear a uniform to prove your manhood. There are other ways to be a man.
Matthew Hennessey is my other example. Though born Catholic, he grew up largely outside his church, and really didn’t accept many of its teachings. In his twenties, he married a charming young woman named Ursula. They had a beautiful little girl named Clara. All signs pointed to a cozy future together.
Then the unexpected intervened. Ursula became pregnant again. A blood test four months into that pregnancy showed a 1 in 66 chance the baby had Down syndrome. Later an amnio test confirmed their worst fears.
Today Matthew says that when people meet his little girl, the first question many ask is this: Did they know before she was born?
The implication, of course, is that only people who did not know would have the baby. The implication is not far off: in America today, only one of ten children diagnosed with Down makes it out of the womb.
In the last few decades, medical advances have raised the life expectancy of children with Down from 25 to 55. We have conquered many of the medical complications associated with Dow syndrome, including birth defects of the heart. And our society has created more opportunities for those with Down to live happy and fulfilling lives. Yet we are deliberately choosing to let fewer of them live.
Here’s how Matthew answers the question whether he and his wife knew their child would be born with Down: “We did know. And I can tell you that we didn’t consider it a gift. At the time, we considered it a painful and confusing curse. We struggled for days and weeks to understand why God had selected us to carry this awful burden. We prayed for an easier path. We begged for it not to be true.”
But it was true.
The news made agonizing what ought to have been a joyful period in their lives. At different times, Matthew and Ursula would become depressed, thinking of the things their as-yet unborn child would never be able to do. Somewhere in that fog, lying in bed one evening, Ursula turned to Matthew and blurted out: “You know we have to have it, you know?”
Without hesitation, Matthew replied, “Of course, I know. That’s what I want too.”
Men of St. Charles, let me emphasize that: Without hesitation.
That was Matthew’s test. What came back from Ursula’s question was more than an answer about this pregnancy. What came back was a liberating assurance: On the journey through life, she would not be alone. Standing beside her would be a man.
Earlier I mentioned how terrible it is for a fellow to look into the mirror and not like what he sees. The flip side is the peace that comes from doing the right thing. Of course, if you praised Matthew Hennessey for what he “sacrificed” to have his daughter, he’d tell you you’re nuts. He’d tell you he has a beautiful little girl named Magdalena, named for the first woman to see the risen Christ. He would tell you that that in the purity each Magdalena smile, he catches a glimmer of the joy her namesake encountered outside that empty tomb.
I know a dozen other men who also have sons or daughters with Down. They would tell you what Matthew would tell you: that they are not simply better men for these children, they are happier men.
Now, you here are young and single, so you may not fully appreciate what that means. I, by contrast, am not young and single. As the father of three girls, at the top of all my prayers is this one: That when a daughter of mine brings home the fellow she has given her heart to, he will be a man like Matthew. A man who will not run when life throws a curve.
I say this because the most striking characteristic of our society today is guys who run: guys who run from responsibility and remain children their whole lives … guys who run from marriage or fatherhood when they get tired of it … guys who get a girl pregnant and run her to the cold front door of an abortion clinic.
Yes, the ladies have their issues. But I’m not talking to ladies today. I’m talking to Carolians. You are here because the people who love you most have put you in a place where you might grow into Christian manhood.
My young friends, most of you will never patrol a dark valley in Afghanistan – or face the kind of news the Hennesseys did. Yet each of you will be tested. The test will come in the everyday things of ordinary life: whether you are faithful to your wife … whether you are a father who puts his children before himself ... whether you are honest and true with those you deal with. Most of all, it will come in those moments when you have a choice: to sit quietly on the sidelines – or to stand up for what’s right and true, especially when standing up for what is right and true means mockery and derision and exclusion.
The good news is that you have a great advantage others do not. You have the witness of St. Charles – and the example of loving men and women who live its principles. At every turn on these beautiful grounds, you see that witness.
You see that witness in the stained-glass window of St. Francis that overlooks this commons and memorializes Kathleen Cavello, a woman who gave this institution her husband, her sons, and herself – because she knew how much our world needs strong, educated Christian men. You see that witness in your wonderful teachers, who so selflessly take their delight in your advancement. You see that witness in every issue of The Cardinal, with those splendid photos of men standing next to wives they have been married to for 40, 50, and 60 years. God willing, generations of St. Charles men yet unborn will see that same witness in the chapters you will write with your own lives.
Let me end with something our pope once wrote about Charles Borromeo. He said: “Charles could convince others because he was a man of conviction. He was able to exist with his certitudes amid the contradictions of his time because he himself lived them. And he could live them because he was a Christian in the deepest sense of the word, in other words, he was totally centered on Christ.”
My young Carolians, that is my hope for you. Bring your strength and conviction into a world that is hungry for them. Never be afraid to speak the name Jesus Christ. And in all you do, let your example lead your fellow citizens to say of these teachers and these halls: They took in boys, and they gave us back men.
Thank you for listening. God bless you all.
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Comments :
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Bill, thanks for this. I just emailed your remarks to both of my teenaged sons.
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Magnificent.
Re: A Man for All Seasons
A magnificent speech requires a magnificent subject. In this instance, you had several. Wonderfully composed, Bill. Very moving.
Aug '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Breathtaking. Thank you Sir for your wordcraft in letting us see these two giants.
Apr '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Very moving and a delight to read. Thanks for sharing it.
Nov '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
It's indeed a magnificent speech. Though I would disagree that the "the most striking characteristic of our society today is guys who run: guys who run from responsibility and remain children their whole lives." This is only half true. The other determining, decisive half is this: The single most striking characteristic of our society is that it's an increasingly emasculated society run essentially by feminist impulses.
Men are fundamentally all about honor in a way women simply are not. (One can write a whole essay about how Sex and the City is the most brilliant distillation of this. The entree to the problem is that none of the female characters are really friends...). If boys are not molded into men whose thumos is taught to be centered around the protection and cherishing of females, then indeed you end up with boys who "drop out," and prefer to sit around playing video games.
But guess what? Even then they're involved in types of honor seeking, however crude. They play Call of Duty, and then phone each other up and say "dude, I beat your a**."
Honor is always about standards, however crude, and holding others to them.
Nov '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Edit of my foregoing comment:
"cherishing of females,"
Should read: female virtue.
Jul '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Splendid.
It's nice to see some Life affirming optimism every once in a while.
A pleasant respite.
Thank You.
Jul '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Beautiful. Just beautiful. Thank you for sharing it with us.
Apr '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
My sister is a developmental pediatrician, a specialist in a congenital condition that causes serious physical problems and mental deficits. She has had the same conversation with parent after parent. People will note the sacrifice and devotion and joy they give to caring for their child and say "He's so lucky you are his parents. Most people couldn't do that. I couldn't do that."
The parents pause and say to my sister: "But they don't understand. We weren't like that before he was born."
Nov '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Should anyone be unaware of my previously employed word "thumos," it's one that defies easy definition. This furthermore brings out my other quibble with this speech.
Manliness is about boasting.
Consider: men tend toward both aggression (our animalistic side) and abstraction (our tendency toward solitude; toward taking charge; or even, sometimes, toward abstract thinking*). Science is cognizant of these discrete elements.
However science is utterly blind to the relations between these discrete elements. Which is to say, modern natural science does not know what human nature is. Aggression and abstraction, for example, cohere as manly assertiveness: i.e., the public making of a point and the defense of it as both the truth and as one's own.
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* Which, contrary to Diane Ellis attacking Larry Summers, men generally do excel at more than women. Steven Pinker of Harvard has written, post Summers imbroglio, about this.
Edited on Nov 20, 2011 at 4:31pmJan '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Indeed. I add my praise.
Apr '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Nicely put. Mackubin Thomas Owens, Professor of Strategy and Force Planning at the U.S. Naval War College and NR contributor, often refers to the necessity of thumos.
It should be clear that thumos, like all virtues, is a matter of balance, and manliness out of balance becomes, if not a vice, then a mockery of itself, machismo, the miles gloriosus. That risk is shown by the initial reaction of Staff Sergeant Miller's family, who wondered whether he had acted out of headless foolhardiness, and the consolation they felt as they came to realize that though he had acted instantly and reflexively, it had been with deliberate, calculated courage.
I have sent this to my daughters and my son.
Apr '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
And as a consequence of the lack of honor among men, under the bright glitzy glissando quartet of SatC, the continuo was a shriek of pain from the women being shredded by the sexual revolution. Honor may be the major mode for men, but reciprocally it is women's role to hold them to it.
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Thanks everyone. For me manliness takes many different forms, and I too decry a feminized culture that does not allow men to be men -- or, perhaps worse, boys to be boys.
That said, I remain skeptical of boasting. Boasting about heroics is different from a boisterous, rough, competition between men, which has a role in creating a manly culture. I know men who have stood up and done incredible things, including (but not limited to) brave actions in war. I remain suspicious of guys who boast how tough they are. In my experience, many of the toughest people have been the quietest -- and often those you would never guess to be the ones who would stand tall when the crunch came and who would stick with it to the end.
Nov '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Grendel
...women being shredded by the sexual revolution.
Good article.
(Wasn't sure what LTR stands for..."long term relationship.")
Indeed, women can't "have it all." No woman who isn't a spiritual-emotional wreck can have casual, emotionless sex like a man (cf. manly "abstraction," above). It never goes well for any woman, independent of what the man thinks of her. Insult to injury: no man respects a woman who jumps into bed with him too soon. Such a woman has been literally conquered by too many other men and is devoid of virtue.
It's interesting that Sex and the City, with varying degrees of subtlety, generally implies, ultimately, that young women would be happier in more traditional relationships.
Women want the man, and they want to be cherished. Men want the honor -- to be had only as consequence of disciplined gentlemanliness -- that comes with being able to provide materially for a woman. But women must first become ladies if one wants gentlemen.
Nov '10
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Points very well taken. I mean boastfulness in the sense that it's the form in which manliness is most readily apprehended and most often seen. Surely many of the most manly men are indeed the quiet types (captured of course inimitably by Clint Eastwood in so many of his films). That manly men tend to be boastful, and too often beyond reason, I surely don't offer as a standard to which to be aspired.
I have in mind boastfulness as inherent to the very process of, as you put it, "boisterous, rough, competition between men." Mansfield points out how women are such good judges -- indeed, judges of men, of their character, etc. Boastfulness inheres in men contending with other men, and women judge the men. They deflate men's pretenses to heroics, etc. Kant says somewhere that every woman's greatest fear is loss of beauty or cherishment. For every man, it's to be seen as a fool.
I'd say boastfulness is a proxy for pride, or a certain quality of pride which even the quiet-but-manly types, I would submit, manifest. Christians might understand this as proper self-love as Aquinas teaches...
Nov '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Bill, thanks, as usual, for words that inform, uplift, and challenge...I am a 50+-year-old woman with Cerebral Palsy whose parents welcomed me as their first-born and gave me the gift of siblings. My academic and vocational participation *pales* in the Resurrection-tinged smile of Magdalena. Blessings on her and her family.
No words can express the awe I feel when confronted with Sgt. Miller's self-gift; may he rest in peace and perpetual light, may his family continue to find meaning, healing and peace. Thanks again.
Apr '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
And thumos is the balancing of that skepticism (internal reflectiveness, purpose) and boasting (external display of prowess). Consider the scene in the first Indiana Jones movie, where Indy, rushing through the Cairo market, is confronted by a big man wielding a big sword. The swordsman boastfully whirls and flips his weapon. Indy gets a pained, don't-waste-my-time expression, pulls out his pistol, and dispatches his assailant with one shot.
So, far from being simple boasting, thumos results from the application of modesty to balance the internal and external masculine powers. (By modesty I mean the virtue that both protects the private self from the gaze of the vulgar and protects the public from too powerful an expression of one's rawer inner self, however true that expression might be.) Holding a door for a lady is a simple but powerful expression of thumos in civil society, which is why it so outrages emasculating feminism.
(I invite Robert Lux's corrections to this completely intuitive defense of thumos.)
Sep '11
Re: A Man for All Seasons
Brilliant! I forwarded on to several people,including our own priest here in Seattle. Thank you Bill.