When I was a student at the University of Detroit High School my English teacher in the eleventh grade was named Father Skiffington. He was a tough Jesuit priest and I was the staff poet on the Cub newspaper. One afternoon Father asked me to remain after class and he sat me down at my desk and said to me. “I read your poem in the paper, Art.” And I said, “Oh.” He didn’t smile but said, “At least you wrote a poem.” And I said, “Oh.” Then he took a deep breath and said, “Art, I believe that God had a plan when he created each and every individual. I believe He gave every human being a talent. Every one of us had the potential of being talented in some way. And if we can somehow discover our unique talent and polish that talent and then work hard to put that talent to work for the good of all mankind, then this can become a wonderful world full of love and peace and understanding.”
I said, “That sounds great, Father.” He nodded and said, “Art, I believe the good Lord put you here to serve as a bad example.” And I thought for just an instant and I agreed.
Just think of that concept. If every one of us is given a unique talent and if we discover that talent and polish that talent and put that talent to work for good then just think what is lost from our society when we encourage people through paying for idleness. Think of all the good that is not done; the love and caring, the positive energy and the creativity that goes unused, untapped, idle. I believe that Father is right. I know that I have discovered certain talents within me. Now the above story is fictionalized. Father Skiffington was being humorous in his own special way. I believe he was encouraging me to spend a bit more time on my poems before they were published in the school paper. In other words, he was saying, “Art, polish your talents, edit, go over it another time.
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