Newtown

Thus far I have remained silent (at least here) on the topic of the tragedy in Newtown, CT.  In part because I was planning for an event in my house; but also because I am not sure there are words pertinent enough to touch the enormity of this heinous crime against humanity.  However, my party is over, the dishes are in the sink, I am so very tired...and yet I am watching CNN re-run the service which took place earlier this evening and I know I can not remain silent any longer.

My father called me Friday. He left a voicemail.  He said, "I am thinking about you as I listen to what is happening at the school in Connecticut.  I love you."  I had no idea to what he was referring.  I immediately called him back and he informed me that there was a mass shooting at an elementary school.  My heart ached as I slowly walked to the television to turn on the news.  The first thing I heard was the school psychologist was killed.  I...am...a school psychologist.  

As I listened to the news unfold I was aghast at the details.  A shooter.  An elementary school.  6 year old children were killed.  A mother was dead.  My mouth fell open as I considered the raw, searing pain these families and this community were experiencing...and would continue to experience for years and years to come.

I am still rather unclear on the details.  I have had to turn the television off today...and instead opt for holiday music to remind me of Christ.

I imagine Christ must seem absent to a lot of people right now.  I imagine that people...all over the world are asking, "How could a loving God allow this to happen?"

In fact, a dear friend, who is a school psychologist in Aurora, CO asked that question of me. She did not ask it out of anger...she asked how I might answer that question should a young person ask me how God could allow such atrocities to occur.  You see...she is being asked to speak...AGAIN...to the children of her community because the wounds are still tender.

The answer I gave her was not mine.  It was one I have gathered from various texts.  As best I can figure...God did not allow this to happen.  God, in fact, is likely grieving just as heavily as we are.  But...since ALL children are HIS children...he cries tears of sorrow and mercy for all those involved.  He laments over the sweet baby angels who met Him on Friday and for their loving caretakers who held their sweet hands as they entered the promised land together.  But make no mistake, God weeps for His child who pulled the trigger.  It is entirely possible God welcomed Him into eternal rest, as well.

I once read Donald Miller write about unimaginable crime.  I think he might have actually been referring to an interview he watched immediately after Columbine.  He wrote that he watched Larry King ask Billy Graham how something like this could happen.  Donald Miller expected a careful, perfect answer which could unlock the mystery of unthinkable acts.  He said he stared into the screen with baited breath for something tangible.  He said Billy Graham sighed and basically said (I paraphrase)...one time in a garden...a man and a woman were told not to eat from a tree; but they did anyhow.  And there you have the mystery...a simple mystery...perhaps not a mystery; but a truth...the truth of free will.    

The families of the fallen will no doubt be paralyzed with pain and anger.  I think, that leaves the rest of us to take up the fight.  Those of us who feel...deeply...but are not directly affected...are left to ask, "What can I do?"  

I believe, with all my heart, at a cellular level that a call to love is the antidote, the panacea to evil...to free will gone awry in the feeble mind of an afflicted.  Evil can take so many forms and enter into the lives of so many individuals.  Evil seems insurmountable, unstoppable, ultimately victorious.  But therein lies "evil's" co-conspiracy.  Evil is potent enough to wear individuals down to a frazzled heap of twisted thoughts and confused emotions.  But I do know this...love triumphs evil every time.  It may not seem so because love is silent, love is not self aggrandizing, love is still and love is certain.  Love is the tortoise, evil is the hare.

I certainly have no answers.  However, I am surrounded by people...amazing people...who teach me to live with love and light and pass that on to others.  And in passing that on to others a beautiful cycle of love will emerge.  Living from a place of love...true love...THAT will conquer evil, no matter how desperately evil attempts to thrive.  

I read a prayer by Max Lucado yesterday.  He wrote it in response to the tragedy at Newtown, CT.  He reminded me that Jesus was born in darkness.  He was born in the darkest part of the night.  He was born in a very dark part of history.  He was born to be "our light." Right now...in this utter darkness...on the eve of celebrating our savior's birth I pray, on my knees, that He is our light through this darkness.  I pray that we turn to Him, not away, during our times of sorrow and struggle-times it is so easy to abandon His sweet grace.  I pray we move forward and operate from a place of love and that said acts of love can affect change. 

In loving memory of 28 people....20 children, 6 educators, one mother and one son.