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April 19, 2007

Reflections on the tragedy at Virginia Tech

I write this on April 16, the day that the terrible, unspeakable tragedy on the campus of Virginia Tech took place. Thirty two young people senselessly slaughtered. Thirty two young people with bright eyes and bright minds gunned down on a campus that was alternately described as ‘tranquil,’ ‘close-knit,’ ‘a family town,’ and ‘a nice safe place.’ My heart immediately went out to the parents – all of the parents who had children at that school. Can you imagine the horror, the shock, disbelief, the grief and the pain of knowing the child you loved, birthed, raised, and finally, but reluctantly, sent off to college had been meaninglessly murdered. How do you make any sense at all of what happened? What do we as Christians do or say about such horrific events?

Well, first we pray – we pray for those who died, and for the parents, siblings, friends and loved ones who lost a child at Virginia Tech. We pray that God will heal the wounds and the hearts of the injured and their family members. We pray for the students, faculty, and administration at Virginia Tech that God’s healing presence will move through them and comfort them in the days and weeks ahead. We pray for both the gunman and his family because when it comes to horrible tragedies like this, no one is ever short of needing a prayer. Secondly, when we can’t make sense of terrible tragedies and suffering like this, when we are searching for care and comfort and especially answers, when we even want to shake our fist at, or cry out to God, we hear the words of the apostle Paul who wrote them in one his times of pain and anguish:

We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. (2 Cor 4: 8-10).

It is to Jesus Christ that we must look in the absurdities and catastrophes of life. The Rev. William Bausch in his book, Storytelling the Word (Twenty-Third Publications, p. 54) says, “Jesus comes across in Scripture as the great pilgrim, the authentic life who did not escape the human condition; who did not know the master plan; who did not have the completed script; who took life day by day and let life’s evil have its full play while God, who would not remove human freedom with all its potential for good and evil, wept at what happened to him.”

I truly believe that God is weeping today at the loss of so many young lives as he wept as Jesus hung on a cross and died. And I also believe that despite our bewilderment and confusion around this event, God asks for our trust, our continued faith. The resurrection of Jesus Christ, who remember had his doubts and who thought God had forsaken him, is proof that God will have the last word. The Easter season we are still celebrating proclaims that fact. God will never abandon us and never stop loving us. We are his adopted children. God holds us in his arms and his love surrounds us. Let us never forget this eternal fact.

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