Welcome. Welcome back to another school year. I wanted to say a year of learning, but that would be narrow focused - as if the learning that you do is contained in the months from September to May. A ridiculous notion I admit. Instead I welcome you to the continuation of your adventurous journey toward the knowledge of the good, true, and beautiful and the calling to do good works. For the very end of education is to know the right thing to do and to do it.
This year, as we ponder the great thoughts, discoveries, and work of the great men and women who have come before us, let us remember that we are called to a greater purpose than a simple utility. Just as Thorstein Veblen insisted that asking "what is the use of this learning?" is as ludicrous as Lewis Carroll's* walrus asking "why the sea is boiling hot, and whether pigs have wings" let us remember that Aristotle and John Adams claim that the end of education isn't to "use it", but to become a good citizen. We are all in the constant state of becoming something (a notion introduced by the ancient Parmenedes), what are you becoming?
Mathematics dives into the world of thought, creation, and beauty; let's dive together. Here's to us finding the calling of God. The calling that we find through our work, study, thought, and worship of the creator. This year, as you continue this journey, I pray that your vocation, "doing the work that you are called to do, that you love to do, that you enjoy so much that you don't like to quit even to eat and sleep"**, becomes clearer and louder. Further in and further up*** my friends!
*Lewis Carroll's fiction and mathematics is mind boggling, beautiful, and fun all at once. You will hear more about him this year!
** A quote I read in a letter written by Wendell Berry on finding our calling
***C.S. Lewis "The Last Battle" (really you should've known this one)
****Do you know from which Shakespeare play the title of this post is derived?