It is 8:30 p.m. on Tuesday night and hundreds of Boston College students are crowded into the Murray Function Room, anxiously anticipating the "last lecture" of Rev. Michael Himes, a professor of theology. Himes' speech was the inaugural lecture at BC in an ongoing series where top academics are asked to give a talk on what they would communicate if it were their last lecture. These talks were inspired by the life of Carnegie Mellon professor Randy Pausch and his book The Last Lecture.
Pausch became a self-proclaimed accidental celebrity due to a lecture he gave at Carnegie Mellon; he spoke of the wisdom he wished to impart upon the world before his death, due to a battle with pancreatic cancer. The talk was originally intended to be for the benefit of his children. However, it had the effect of inspiring millions, including other academics such as Himes, who are now tackling the challenge of giving their own "last lectures" at colleges across the United States.
Himes began by defining what he determined to be the most important aspects of life. "Thinking of this as the last time I have a chance to think of what matters most to me, I have thought hard about it and wondered, have I uttered the great, definite message definitely?" Himes said.
The entire lecture and Himes' proposed approach toward life was based on a single piece of biblical wisdom. "It is a statement I have spoken, read, and preached about many times; it is repeated in Matthew, Mark, and Luke: The statement of Jesus that if you hold on to your life, you lose it, but if you give your life away, you have everlasting life," Himes said. "I did not understand this statement for a long time; I often thought of it as a commandment. Only after a time did it occur to me that it is not a commandment at all, rather, it is a description, because being and giving oneself turn out to be the same thing."
The primary first step in this process of giving oneself away is to learn to love others, Himes said. "If we're going to exist, we need to give ourselves away, for the reason there is something from nothing, reason anything exists at all, is love and self-giving," Himes said. "The necessary first step in knowing anyone or anything is that you have to love that thing."
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