“Beyond Mountains There Are Mountains”

2014 总统召开
Huntingdon College, Montgomery, Alabama
September 3, 2014

“How do you decide what to talk about”?

So goes the question put to me by someone at the College, at least twice a year, around the time of the year’s first speech — at 总统召开 — and the time of the year’s last speech
— at the Baccalaureate Service on Graduation Weekend. “How do you decide what to talk about”?
答案很简单，我环顾四周。 I look around to see what is happening in the world at that particular time — far away and nearby. I try to connect what is happening in the world — far away and nearby — with what is happening in the lives of our students. 在你们的生活中。

两年前，2012年8月，我在伦敦观看夏季奥运会的电视转播。 I was amazed at the exploits of the world’s fastest human, Usain Bolt of Jamaica. 博尔特刚刚获得了一枚金牌，正在接受采访。记者说了一半，他突然拦住了记者，转向正在为另一个项目颁发奖牌的领奖台，恭恭敬敬地站着，听着《星条旗永不落》的歌声。 电视记者拿着麦克风，哑口无言。 当《星条旗永不落》奏完后，博尔特先生转身继续接受采访。

这是一个令人难以置信的时刻，一位以自信（有些人会说傲慢）和对国家的热爱而闻名的运动员，提醒了我们所有人奥林匹克精神。 It’s a spirit, as you know, that unites both individual athletes from different nations and the various nations themselves in a time of peace and goodwill through athletic competition, however brief that moment may be. How fitting, I thought in summer 2012, to connect Usain Bolt’s expression of respect for another athlete and another nation with the spirit of Division III athletics at Huntingdon. The Olympic spirit… the Division III spirit. 在两年前的毕业典礼上，把尤塞恩·博尔特举为所有学生的榜样是多么合适啊。 可以肯定的是，无论你是一名运动员，还是一个把所有时间都花在图书馆里、从未见过太阳的人，你都把自己的个人优势和身份带到了校园。 Whoever you are — you are here, at this college, to form a community of respect for each other and to learn how to live with people different than you.

That’s what I talked about two years ago, connecting the Olympics and Usain Bolt with life at Huntingdon.

Nine years ago, as the semester began, I looked around the world I was living in — nearby -­ and I saw something that really bugged me. 真的很困扰我。 Everywhere I went on campus, I saw running shorts, T-shirts, hats and visors emblazoned in orange and blue, crimson and white, with “A’s” and the “A Words.” Almost no scarlet and grey and white, almost no “H’s” and the “H Word,” to be found anywhere. 这真的让我很困扰。 And I asked myself: “How can we ever build up this College and help our students become loyal alumni of the school that is giving them their start in the world if they are walking billboards for other schools? 我们能做些什么来帮助我们的学生对自己的身份感到自豪？ 如何让我们的学生对成为澳门金沙网赌娱乐的学生感到兴奋？ How to get our students fired up about living into a motto that is distinctive among all the colleges and universities in Alabama: ‘Enter to Grow in Wisdom; Go Forth to Apply Wisdom in Service’ ? How to do all that?”

因此，我在2005年的校长毕业典礼上发表了一篇演讲，列出了澳门金沙网赌娱乐大学之所以优秀的十大原因。 名单上的第一名：我们的学生，你们，是特别的； 我们的学生，也就是你们，几乎不像你们的朋友那样，不得不满足于上几乎所有人都在上的大学。 其他学校都很伟大，每一所学校都有自己的方式，他们的许多毕业生都以自己的方式取得了伟大的成就。 我们可以，也确实尊重他的伟大。 但我们的学生，你们，可以脱颖而出，被注意到，发展自己独特的生活。 You don’t have to wear an “A” hat. Or another “A” hat. You get to wear the “H” hat!

你知道吗？ 那篇演讲起作用了。 你的母校澳门金沙网赌娱乐大学是美国南部发展最快的四年制大学，也是全国发展速度第12快的四年制大学。 Can I get a “Hawk ‘Em!”? Can I get a louder “Hawk ‘Em!”? How would we have ever achieved this distinction if we had kept on walking around every day as billboards for someone else’s school? 你们将受益于独特的教育，独特的大学经历。 所以今天，当你走在校园里的时候，看看。 No “A’s”…or other “A’s.” 说到这一点，斯塔布斯院长从来没戴过塞瓦尼帽。 李副总统从来没有戴过伍福德帽子。 麦克迈克尔教授从来没有戴过杜克大学的帽子。 We wear the “H” hat! 我们在打猎！ 我们是一家人！

现在我们来到2014年9月。 在今天的总统毕业典礼演讲中，我要说些什么呢？ 今年夏天我四处看了看，我看到了什么？ 俄罗斯和乌克兰之间的战争。 激进的伊斯兰国家对其他信仰的人发动袭击，试图消灭他们。 美国可悲的历史耻辱，白人和黑人之间的分裂，继续上演——这一次是在密苏里州的弗格森。 How to connect all of that reality with what is going on in your lives — and give you an encouraging message of hope at the same time — as you begin your college year?

I decided to look around again at a more nearby world — this time, the world of my own family, where my son William graduated high school in May and went off to begin life at a small four­ year college out-of-state last week. 一所很像澳门金沙网赌娱乐的大学。 事实上，我儿子明天11点会坐在一个和这个教堂很像的礼堂里，听他的总统讲话。 Maybe, I thought to myself, I can find a hopeful message if I stop and look at what is going on in my 18 year old son’s life…and in the lives of all you 18 year olds who have just graduated high school and started college.

我花了好几个星期想把这些线索联系起来。 然后有一天晚上，我坐在楼上的房子里，让我的思绪游荡，我抬起头，发现自己正盯着一幅画

已经盯了100次了。 这张照片是我的儿子威廉和我的妻子伊丽莎白（她今天也在这里）坐在他们刚刚爬过的山顶上，位于北卡罗来纳州西部的蓝岭公园大道上。 我瞬间就知道今天在接下来的演讲中要和你们谈些什么。

I’m going to talk with you about what I want you to get out of college. I’m going to talk about what I want your college years here at Huntingdon to be for you, what I want you to take away from here when you graduate. 我接下来的演讲灵感来自这张照片，这张照片也可以是你和你的父母之一，或者你的祖父母之一，或者你生命中任何重要的老年人。 看看这张照片，看看你自己。

When I look at this picture, I imagine my wife saying to my son: “Your job is to find out what the world is trying to be.” “Your job is to find out what the world is trying to be.” That’s a line from a poem by William Stafford (“Vocation”). 也许有一天你会在英语课上学习威廉·斯塔福德； 他是20世纪美国最伟大的诗人之一。 This line from his poem — “Your job is to find out what the world is trying to be” — is a good way to describe what is supposed to happen here at Huntingdon during your college years. 并不是所有的学院和大学都有这种教育理念。 But since you are distinctive and are wearing the “H” hat, you will be focused while you are in college on “find(ing) out what the world is trying to be.”

你爬上那座山，坐在一块叫澳门金沙网赌娱乐的岩石上。 你站在这块岩石上看着你的余生。 Your job, sitting on this rock on top of this mountain, is to “find out what the world is trying to be.” 在你对你的职业做出决定之前； 在你决定你的第一份工作之前； before you make a decision about graduate school — I want you to look out, and listen to, those mountains there ahead of you. 找出这个世界想要变成什么样子。 然后，也只有在那之后，告诉你的生命，你要对它做些什么，以帮助这个世界成为它想要成为的样子。

这个世界想要变成什么样子，你的生活是如何融入这个世界的呢？ 我在之前的演讲中给了你们一个提示。 这个世界正在努力成为一个我们尊重彼此，在我们的差异中站在一起的地方，即使我们庆祝我们作为个体的身份。 正如威廉·斯塔福德在他的另一首诗中写道：

If you don’t know the kind of person I am and I don’t know the kind of person you are a pattern that others made may prevail in the
world…
(” A Ritual to Read to Each 其他”)

That’s the message of the story I told you about Usain Bolt — proud and thankful to be a Jamaican; 为自己是奥运金牌得主而自豪和感恩； 他为自己被赋予了身体上的天赋而感到骄傲和感激，并发展了这些天赋，使他成为有史以来跑得最快的人。 与此同时，尤塞恩·博尔特（Usain Bolt）谦逊而恭敬地为另一个国家的喜悦而庆祝； humble and respectful enough to celebrate another athlete’s gold medal; humble and respectful enough to acknowledge that another’s gifts and another’s triumph in life are just as important as his.

Respecting and standing beside another, in their differences, even as he celebrates who he is…so that a pattern others made may not prevail in the world.

这就是世界正在努力实现的目标，无论是在你的生活中，还是在尤塞恩·博尔特的生活中，都是如此。 It’s your job during your years at Huntingdon to look and listen for the times, and places, and ways your world can be like this. It’s your job at Huntingdon to begin thinking about how to design your life so that the world can be like this…now…and during all the years ahead that rise in front of you like mountains. 越过这块岩石，越过这座山，还有其他的山。
What I want you to get from college and take from college is a resolve, an attitude that says: “I have climbed this mountain to be here awhile; 学习; 把我的思想和心灵与这个世界试图成为的样子联系起来； to look out and see what other mountains are there waiting for me to climb, what other mountains are there waiting to tell me what the world is trying to be.” That’s your job as a Huntingdon student.

山那边有山。 这就是生活的本质。 振作起来，我的朋友们。 是勇敢的。 你不是一个人在旅途中。 看这幅画。 你不是一个人在旅途中。 记住以色列和教会的古代祷告，你们可以在《圣经解释》中学习到。 《诗篇》121篇：

我举目望向群山。 我的帮助从何而来？
我的帮助从造天地的耶和华而来。 God won’t let your foot slip.
Your protector won’t fall asleep on the job. The Lord will protect you on your journeys… from now until forever from now.
(诗篇121.1 - 3,8)

你不是一个人在旅途中。

去爬那些山吧。 Keep searching for what God’s world is trying to be. And then tell your life — mountains beyond mountains, mountain after mountain you will climb — what you intend to do with it.

谢谢你听我说。 And let all the people say: “Hawk ‘Em!”

j·卡梅隆·韦斯特学院院长

+来自海地谚语：对诗篇121.1- 3,8和罗马书8.19-23的沉思