Wendell Berry - Bellarmine University

But what is the category? For the answer, read on.

In the academy, May is the season of commencement addresses. I have followed lists of commencement speakers ever since I read Mark Edmundsons piece about the trend in higher education to reduce education to entertainment.

Heres a snippet: Before they arrive, we ply the students with luscious ads, guaranteeing them a cross between summer camp and lotusland. When they get here, flattery and nonstop entertainment are available, if that's what they want. And when they leave? How do we send our students out into the world? More and more, our administrators call the booking agents and line up one or another celebrity to usher the graduates into the new millennium. This past spring, Kermit the Frog won himself an honorary degree at Southampton College on Long Island; Bruce Willis and Yogi Berra took credentials away at Montclair State; Arnold Schwarzenegger scored at the University of Wisconsin-Superior. At Wellesley, Oprah Winfrey gave the commencement address. (Wellesley -- one of the most rigorous academic colleges in the nation.) At the University of Vermont, Whoopi Goldberg laid down the word. But why should a worthy administrator contract the likes of Susan Sontag, Christopher Hitchens, or Robert Hughes -- someone who might actually say something, something disturbing, something "offensive" -- when he can get what the parents and kids apparently want and what the newspapers will softly commend -- more lite entertainment, more TV?

Read the entire essay here.

I would encourage you to look at the commencement speakers at Catholic colleges and universities and judge for yourself. (By and large, a very impressive list.) For a relatively complete list of college and university commencement speakers, click here.

My pick for best choice of a commencement speaker at a Catholic campus for 2007 is:

Wendell Berry, Bellarmine University

Berry is an American treasure. Author of countless books, he writes beautifully as a novelist, poet, and essayist. His communitarian sensibilities are a wonderful tonic to the crass individualism of our culture. Here are links to various works.

Click here to read one of Berrys poems. For an interview with Berry, click here. To hear Berry reading from his work, A World Lost, click here.

I will refrain from naming my pick for the worst choice for a commencement speaker in the 2007 season, but feel free to post your own.