Welcome

Success and purpose of the breakfast

Talk about Culture

The character debate

SPU's character

SPU's vision

Greater Seattle Community Breakfast
TEXT OF PRESIDENT PHILIP EATON'S OPENING REMARKS

I would like to add my words of welcome to you all here this morning. It occurred to me as I was coming down here this morning that five years ago we began this breakfast with 300 people in this room, and now we are filling this room with close to a thousand people, and there is a waiting list to get into this breakfast. So, welcome. We are really glad you are here.

Since we gathered last year at this time for our business breakfast, a lot of things have happened. A-Rod moved to Texas and an earthquake shook us to our bones -- those two are not necessarily connected. Of course, Boeing decided to partially leave town, shaking our confidence a bit and taking a little swagger out of our step here at the moment in Seattle. The Sonics were sold, bringing good coffee to the games at least. And then there was Mardi Gras. It's been quite a year, to say the least.

But it's just great to have you all here this morning. As I look out across this audience, I see so many friends: business leaders, political leaders and professional folks in this city. And we are glad you are here. We are glad to count you all among our friends. My sense is that people are discovering what we are all about at Seattle Pacific, and are coming alongside us. We appreciate that very much. Thanks for being here this morning.

Let me add my thanks just briefly to our sponsors this morning. To John Rindlaub and all of the people at Bank of America, thank you for your partnership. We thank Bill Clancy and the folks at Cornerstone, so many of whom are SPU alums. And then to Skip Li and your partners at Ellis, Li & McKinstry, we thank you. Thank you all for your support and your partnership.

And let me say a word now about our distinguished speaker, Dr. William Bennett. Each year we try to find someone, one of the really strong voices speaking out in the public square today. We look for someone who speaks on the issues of the day -- that's the reason for this breakfast -- someone who speaks with a voice that shares what we value at Seattle Pacific. And I want to say I believe that Bill Bennett is one of the truly important moral voices of our day. And Bill, it's just great to have you here today.

I also want to remind all of the Democrats in the room that we did have George Mitchell here last year. And while this is not in any way a political breakfast, we do try to find some balance, and establish that balance, in terms of the people who are speaking on the issues of our time.

I want to recognize two former presidents of Seattle Pacific. Dr. Curtis Martin and Dr. David Le Shana are here with us today. I am so grateful to both of you for your enormous contributions to our fine university, and we thank you. I want to thank Bob McIntosh and Alec Hill for providing leadership for this breakfast this morning, and I want to thank the steering committee for all of the work that has been done behind the scenes working on the details of this breakfast. My thanks to all of you. And thanks to David Anderson, by the way, our choral director, and these fabulous students who are up earlier than they want to be, and yet come out here to perform for us. I am so proud of this group. This is an award-winning choral program, and we're proud to present them to you.

Let me mention that this is Alec Hill's last time to be with us here in this role. As so many of you know, Alec is moving on to become the president of Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. And the good news here is that we know how to grow leaders at SPU. The bad news is we will miss Alec. Alec has given tremendous leadership to the School of Business, and we appreciate him so much, and wish Alex and Mary and their family all the best as they open this new chapter in their lives.

This breakfast has been a great success for us at Seattle Pacific. We are delighted, and sometimes really astonished, by the response we have received from the community. And I think I know some of the reason for that success. It's because we have good friends. It's because we are making lots of new friends. It's also because we are willing to raise important issues in this community, to seek together to have meaningful conversation about what's happening in the world, and to discuss how we might make a difference.

The purpose of this breakfast grows right out of our vision for Seattle Pacific. As I often say: We want to be at the table of change in this community. We want to make a difference. We want a university that is engaged, relevant and helpful. This is our vision. We are trying to turn a university inside-out, to focus outward in all that we do. We are trying sincerely to be helpful in the community, to make our contribution. We have some big problems in the world. Some of these problems have us deeply troubled and confused about what to do. And I'm not sure we know how to talk about those problems. We need some lessons about how to talk. We need to listen to people like Bill Bennett.

I was working out one morning last week and happened to remote my way into hearing Bryant Gumbel confronting our new attorney general, John Ashcroft, with some measure, I felt, of disdain. He said, "So, what is the Bush Administration going to do to keep our schools safe from violence?" And I thought: What a silly question. As if the Bush Administration -- or any administration -- is going to solve the problems of our children shooting children. We've got to take this discussion a step or two deeper, don't we?

Here's my premise: I think we have to talk about culture. We have to be able to talk about a moral culture that we have created, that allows and promotes the disregard for human life and human dignity that we see in our schools and in our streets. To talk about culture means that we have to talk about presuppositions; we have to talk about what it means to be human. We have to ask about human destiny. We have to talk about the purpose and meaning of life. We have to talk about community and the common good. We have to learn not to be shrill when we talk about these things.

Time magazine journalist Nancy Gibb said that Columbine opened a sad national conversation that promises to be a long, hard talk. And I think she is right. David Horsey from the Seattle P-I has said we must face the real ugliness of Mardi Gras and stop placing the blame on the police or the mayor. Nothing less than civilization is at stake here, Horsey suggests, and civilization is not a permanent state. It must be reforged with every new generation.

In a marvelous and yet disturbing new book, the sociologist James Davidson Hunter says that character is dead. Attempts to revive it will yield little. Its time has passed. The social and cultural conditions that make character possible are no longer present, and no amount of political rhetoric, legal maneuvering, educational policymaking or money can change that reality. Character is dead. What a disturbing, and frightening, conclusion.

I know exactly what Hunter is saying, but I resist it with all my heart. He is saying you can't form character if you don't have a congruent, coherent culture. And I want to say: We are deeply and intentionally committed to character formation at Seattle Pacific. It's part of our vision. Are we naive to think we can make an impact on the lives of our students? Are we whistling in the wind to think we can contribute to reshaping a culture out of which our children and our students, our young people, learn to be good people?

We are a Christian university. And I think that provides us an opportunity to ask about underlying assumptions and presuppositions. Of course, we try to do this with appropriate respect for everyone. But we also know that our faith tradition has been pushed to the margins of the public square. And I say: What a shame. What a danger. We need all the voices we can get. We need the Good News. We need wisdom. Let's show our younger generation we can grow up and have a talk about things that really matter. This is culture work. This is the work that must be done, I think. And I am convinced it is the real work for our time.

In a minute we are going to show you a brand new film that we are working on, a bit of a work in progress that you are the first audience to see. I want to say this is not really a promotional film. This is a film where we have really tried to capture our vision. We've tried to capture some of the stories of character formation that we are so deeply committed to; some of the stories of our students, our graduates and our faculty making a difference; some of the culture-shaping work that is going on in our place and beyond.

So, is character dead, as Hunter tells us? Is civilization coming apart at the seams, as Horsey suggests? Can we do something about it? I want you to listen to these people in the film. Watch these students. I'm banking that we can make a difference. We had better be trying at least. We had better learn how to talk together. But you know what? That's exactly what we're doing with this breakfast. Gathering together, thinking through the issues of the day, lifting up those important issues, trying always not to be shrill as we talk together. And then seeking to move out and make a difference in our community, to make our community a better place to live.

So, we thank you for being here. Really, we thank you most of all for engaging with us in this important conversation. Thank you.