the light bright through the house

a dream of a new performing arts center

my working life I have given to Carolina Friends School,

to an institution whose existence only matters

to the degree to which we are true to our students,

to their needs, to their possibilities,

to that of God within them that seeks to blaze brightly,

I am in awe of the vision, the dream,

the audacious choosing of possibility over doubt

that those first dreamers dared to imagine,

they imagined a school that was as true to the students

as George Fox worked to be true to God revealed,

I was welcomed into the dream long ago,

and this is my 45th year of living the calling there,

the charge to be true to the wholeness

potential within each student,

every day, in every class, 

teacher and student here work to learn,

to be true to the best possible,

we have found a way to have a gym, fields, tennis courts,

to support the physical as a path to wholeness,

now we are close to a leap of faith

to have a performing arts facility

that can more fully match the possibilities 

inherent within our students

in terms of performance, 

the light can then shine brightly through the house,

and people can see the good works 

that now have so many limits

as to the audience we can know,

George Fox spoke of the light within all,

the Sermon on the Mount charged us to let that light shine to all, 

a new performing arts center can help that to be true.

by Henry H. Walker

October 16, ‘15