”Reflecting Light”
Address of Bishop Dr. Matti Repo to the Conference of University and College Chaplains, Campus Ministers and Religious Professionals, Tampere 30 June 2008

Reflecting Light: what a simple, concise and yet a most rich and beautiful overall theme for a conference. The participants are invited to reflect on several topics in detail, including those of Faith, Justice and Profession. The subthemes all articulate vital dimensions in our common vocation as human beings living together. A conference of University researchers could probably reflect on light as an optic phenomenon or as electromagnetic radiation. But what does a conference of University Chaplains do when it is invited to reflect light and not to reflect on light? What can be expected from such a meeting? What kind of results will there be to take home, apart from a thick folder full of conference papers?

An international conference of specialists will offer plenty of opportunities for exchange, for sharing common questions, for new experiences and knowledge on various interesting themes. Apart from that, a conference located in a venue new for many participants will also grant a bit widened perspective on the world. All this will be helpful for intellectual and emotional reflections on the light – be it this time of northern type. As we know, the sun shines the same way all around the world, but its light is reflected very differently in the North than in the South. For instance, a fine artists might paint with different colors at home in Finland than on a study trip to the Mediterranean.

However, I am convinced that reflecting colors in the pale Nordic sunshine is not all that can be expected from this consultation. I am sure the persons responsible for organizing the conference have carried out all their preparations in hope for a more substantial outcome. You who have travelled from a distance or from the near, will probably join in the hope that the light would shine on you and be reflected in you.

Your work among students, teachers and researchers is a work characterized by a quest for light. Universities, colleges and institutes all exist because of human thirst for light - light of knowledge, light of understanding, light of a just and dignified life. My hope and prayer for the conference is, that the light you experience during these days, be it of optical or empirical nature, or be it spiritual and contemplative by nature, would unhindered illuminate your work, your discussions and thoughts. In this prayer I join St. Paul’s reflections on the light of God as reflected on us. St Paul portraits us a wondrous perspective of hope, looking from the present to the future, from the incomplete and broken to the perfect and whole, from the world affected by sin to the final reconciliation in the eschatological fullness of the creation.
In his first letter to Corinthians, St. Paul writes: “Now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.” (1 Cor. 13,12)

In his second letter to the same congregation, the Apostles writes: “All of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as through reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” (2 Cor. 3,18)

In this hope for the “Reflecting Light”, I wish the conference warmly welcome to the Christian fellowship of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland.