When I was young, I don’t remember ever being afraid to go to school or thinking something terrible would happen. Sure, there were the occasional fake bomb threats called into the high school by someone with nothing better to do, but it always seemed so fake. We did the drill, walked outside the building, and stood on the sidewalk while the police swept the school. I’m not sure how protected we were, but I think it’s because no one believed the unbelievable events could happen to us. Then, at the end of my freshman year in college, in April 1999, the massacre at Columbine High School happened. I was 275 miles from my home and nearly 1700 miles away from Columbine, but my world felt off-kilter and not as safe and secure as I imagined it was. I couldn’t wrap my head around how a student could kill other students. I mean, I was bullied through most of my years in school, but violence and retribution were never the answers I sought. How was I different from the “evil” people who could shoot others? In retrospect, who am I to label others as evil?
I knew evil as a concept existed in the world, but talk about a reality check of realizing you grew up privileged and safe. The Columbine Massacre would, unfortunately, be the first in a line of devastating world events to begin to shape and continue to rework my views and perspectives in this world. September 11th happened during my senior year of college as I was student teaching in a middle school music classroom. It was such a surreal experience that I still replay events in my head 23 years later, and it will probably continue for as long as I live. I didn’t know anyone personally affected by the tragedy, but those experiences continued to contour my young adult mind.
Fast forward over a decade, and I would be left with deep questions and no answers again. I do not think anything could have prepared me for sending my children happily to school on December 14th, 2012, to watch in horror as 20 first graders, the same age as my oldest, were killed with six of their teachers only a few towns over from where we lived. Suddenly, these safe places we sent our children to each day were no longer secure, and there was little we could do. And now, here we are 12 years later, with school only in its first month, and two different school shootings have happened in America. It infuriates me because it truly leaves me feeling helpless. My 18-year-old, who is doing her college degree virtually, told me she has nightmares about gunmen coming into classrooms, and she’s not even in the schools anymore. This was when I knew I had to process some of what was happening around us non-partisanly but rather through faith.
That didn’t make it much easier, but taking the politics out of it, I know that a fundamental human right should be to feel safe in body and mind in your home, office, school, environment, and anywhere you go. Unfortunately, this isn’t true for many places in the world. Yes, schools should be a safe place, and no guns don’t belong in schools, but beyond that, I don’t have any answers. I told my daughter we cannot control other people’s decisions or live our lives in fear. So, we must pray until we can figure out how to help. Pray for guidance, the ability to look beyond our fear, and the ability to understand those who are different from us, that we never exclude someone but always work to include people in Jesus’s name. It’s a small start….
Blessings,
Amanda