"My Work To Me Was Sacred"
Theme for Williamson's 2007-08 School Year

Each year, we choose a theme to focus on for the academic year.  The themes have all come from either Mr. Williamson’s words or from the Bible.  They are designed to identify a characteristic of the life of a Williamson man, and they give us a chance to integrate that character quality into the year’s program in a special way.

The theme for year 2007-2008 will be the sacred nature of our life’s work.  Our goal in considering this theme will be to learn how work, a significant part of our life’s path, is made sacred by obedience to Truth. 

Mr. Wanamaker’s biography of Mr. Williamson described in some detail how Mr. Williamson viewed his life’s calling. “I found that obedience to the truth given to me answered my desire to be shown the path for my life.”  He realized his “occupational gift” dealt with what he referred to as his “money-making instinct” and that he received that gift in order to accomplish something significant. In humility, Mr. Williamson described his work activities.  “My calling was only to do common things, which I tried to do humbly, but in an uncommon way.”  It was in this context that he described his work as sacred.  He mentioned that others easily understand how a teacher’s work or an artist’s work could have a sacred dimension, but he believed that his efforts as a businessman were no less sacred.  And he believed that for good reason.

Mr. Williamson understood what made his work sacred.  It was the excellence and success he achieved in its completion and the good and noble consequences he achieved for having been successful.  His talent and work provided him tools to accomplish business goals and to lift the man and boy next to him as far as he could reach.  He did not see these products of his work as a crowning of power for himself, but instead as a tribute, “to Him who gave it (talent) to me.”

A recent contemporary example of the sacred nature of our work took place at the campus of Virginia Tech on April 16th.  Professor Liviu Librescu became a 76 year old hero as he held a classroom door closed while the gunman attempted to enter and murder the students.  As a result of Professor Librescu’s efforts, no students in the classroom were killed, but he lost his own life as a consequence of his actions.  This was a man whose life had been framed by his profession.  He was a holocaust survivor that ended up after World War II in communist Romania as an aeronautic engineer.  He lost his position there when he refused to swear allegiance to the government.  Through special intervention by Israel, he and his family were allowed to leave Romania, and because of his extraordinary skill and reputation as an engineer, he eventually found himself at Virginia Tech where he was on the faculty for 20 years.  When his son provided a tribute to Dr. Librescu, he appropriately summed up his father when he said, “His work was his life in a sense.” The Professor lived out his values as an engineer.  The most powerful messages of his life may not have been the countless published articles in engineering journals.  Instead they may have been his standing for what was right when he risked his career and life by refusing to give a corrupt government the oath it demanded, and when he refused to give up the students in his care when a murderer demanded them from him.

This year we will work to achieve a more complete understanding of the value and importance of our occupation and our work.  In chapel and in classrooms and in the shops we will emphasize that the “end goal” of our work is much nobler than the things our paychecks will purchase for our use and pleasure.  The highest and most noble purposes of our occupations and work are tied to the plan for our life which is revealed by obedience to truth.  It is easy to understand how our School’s values of Faith, Integrity, Diligence, Excellence and Service are all tied to how we view our own work as sacred.