Beauty in the silence: Professor Kim Trevathan extols virtues of finding the quiet at 2023 Maryville College Baccalaureate service
May 5, 2023
Words, Kim Trevathan told the Maryville College Class of 2023 during Friday night’s Baccalaureate service, have long been a commodity.
Trevathan — a writing communication professor who retires this month after 23 years at Maryville College — has spent much of his career “writing, talking about writing, and trying to get some of you to talk about writing,” he told the assembled seniors who gathered at 4 p.m. Friday in the Ronald and Lynda Nutt Theatre of the Clayton Center for the Arts.
But as students prepare for Commencement — scheduled for Saturday, May 6 — it’s important to consider the power provided by the absence of words.
“The longer I taught, the more I saw that shutting up and listening to students was something I needed to do more of, and that being quiet in the world led them to learn in ways I hadn’t anticipated,” he said.
Trevathan: Embrace the Silence
Trevathan was introduced by MC President Dr. Bryan Coker, and while the address at the traditional Baccalaureate service — a more intimate and reverential affair preceding the pomp and circumstance of the following day’s Commencement celebration — is often referred to as a “sermon,” Trevathan confessed surprise at being chosen by the graduating class to deliver a “spiritual message.”
“I did go to church as a kid, but what I remember most was sitting with my friends on the farthest row up in the balcony of our enormous Baptist church, stifling laughter and not being able to stop while the pastor engaged in vivid descriptions of Hell, enhanced by sibilant whistles on the ‘S’ sounds,” he told the assembled crowd with a familiar sardonic grin. “We weren’t laughing at the sermon so much as our own lack of control, of doing the most inappropriate thing in the most inappropriate place. So I’m OK with those of you sitting way in the back. I see you.”
Trevathan began his address — titled “Keeping Silence: The Power of Quiet in a World Full of Noise” — by relating a story from his nature writing class, “Words and the Land.” It was in 2005, he recalled, that he took those students on an excursion one chilly January day to Whiteoak Sinks in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, a trip designed to encourage observation of the natural world in order to inspire fiction, poetry or nonfiction.
The descent along an unofficial trail included a class “full of talkers,” he remembered, students who would go on to practice law or work in corporate environments who were never at a loss for words. But at the sinks, a small waterfall along one of the Park’s myriad creeks and streams, a remarkable thing happened: The group paused along the rocks to snack and rest before hiking back out, and a silence descended upon them all.
“Everybody just stopped talking, and it lasted and lasted,” he said. “I could tell that the students were reluctant to break it, that there was something magical about the silence, something spontaneous and natural. I bet it lasted 10 or 15 minutes, which doesn’t sound that long, but for a group of 10 talkers and a professor who gets paid to talk, it’s a long time. We just sat there, not really looking at each other much, and were content with remaining silent.
“Now, thinking back, I wonder why the silence that day was so memorable, and I came up with four reasons. No. 1, it was spontaneous and unplanned and not work, like formal meditation can be. No. 2, there was a restorative quality to being able to just sit and not talk, and really having to think about anything at all. No. 3, it was communal and something we shared, not at all like the awkward silence that you sometimes have in the classroom after asking a question. And No. 4: It was revelatory in a way that’s impossible to explain, a memory that transcends all of the words I’ve tried to say about the value of time spent outdoors. It stands alone.”
That lesson, he continued, remains a reminder — for him, and for the Class of 2023, he added — that there is power in silence, and that embracing those moments in life often feel like the clarity of a storm’s eye or the sight of harbor lights after long and arduous days at sea. There is a time for silence, a point punctuated by the reading of Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 prior to the sermon by Sarah Rackley ’23, a sociology major from Rydal, Georgia, and one of two graduating seniors who read Scripture passages before Trevathan’s sermon.
While familiar to most people as the passage that describes how “for everything there is a season,” it often is overlooked that the virtues of silence are included within, Trevathan said. Verse 7, he pointed out, mentions it specifically: “A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak.”
“Silence in its purest sense is rarer and rarer to find in a world full of noise — not just the noise coming from your phone, laptop, television, PlayStation, Artificial Intelligence, and yes, even books, but also inner noise, including self-doubt, hating on others, intolerance, unfocused rage — (all of it) coming at us in all directions,” he said. “Just remember not to neglect silence, and listening, as a lifelong learning tool, as a restorative way of being, especially outside in the woods, the mountains, the rivers — in a boat or on foot. Sometimes the learning, the enlightenment, will come to you. Take time to be silent. Take time to listen to the silence.”
Candelario: ‘We Got This’
Senior class President Allie Osorio Candelario also took the podium on Friday afternoon to offer the traditional Senior Remarks. For the Class of 2023, she pointed out, what began as a typical college experience was upended in the spring of their first year by COVID-19.
What followed, she acknowledged, was a great deal of uncertainty and fear, on the other side of which was intellectual maturity, personal growth and collegiate accomplishment that have well-prepared the soon-to-be graduates for life beyond the College’s historic grounds.
“I just want to say that we got this,” she said. “Yes, change is scary. Yes, we do not have the perfect step-by-step plan. But you know what we do have? The knowledge and experience from here, at Maryville College. We have developed resiliency, communication skills and critical thinking skills, essential components that will help us in the world. We have also built bonds and memories with students and faculty and staff.
“These connections are something that I will cherish for a lifetime, and I hope you all feel the same,” she added.
Candelario, a neuroscience major from Sevierville, Tennessee, is one of more than 200 seniors who will take part in this year’s Commencement ceremony. The Baccalaureate service, which was followed by a senior barbecue on the Clayton Center plaza, also included contributions from other seniors: Maddie Taylor ’23, a political science major from Arlington, Tennessee, who read Proverbs 17:24-28 before the sermon, and Craig Harville ’23, an elementary education major from Maryville and president of the MC Fellowship of Christian Athletes, who offered both the Prayer of Thanksgiving and the Lord’s Prayer. Music was provided by the Maryville College Concert Choir, accompanied by Chase Hatmaker ’14 on keyboards and Amber Nejme-Hatmaker ’16 on percussion, and Interim Campus Minister Jamie Webster delivered both the Opening Prayer and the Benediction.
