I'm listening to the radio, and hearing that Virginia Tech tolled their bells 32 times today. And I heard that they're holding a vigil. For the 32 victims of the shooting. But 33 people have died. One of them murdered the other 32, yes; I don't mean to exonerate him from responsibility. But he's still dead. He's part of the tragedy, too.
I remember last year, when a gunman killed five Amish schoolgirls and himself. According to CNN, a member of the Brethren community living nearby said to a reporter: "I don't think there's anybody here that wants to do anything but forgive and not only reach out to those who have suffered a loss in that way but to reach out to the family of the man who committed these acts."
Another said:
"We must not think evil of this man."
I think we risk turning Seung-Hui Cho into a subhuman Other - some kind of animal - by excluding him from the mourning. And we shun and further alienate his family by excluding them. We are all human. We are all capable of evil. The easiest thing to do when dealing with great evil is to choose a group to punish and isolate as "the evil one," rather than accepting that we're all in this together here on planet earth, here as children of God.
on a blog i appreciate, "the ice floe", she reflected yesterday from the perspective of one who works on a university campus and has worked on lots of campuses in lots of different roles and she was thinking last night of the family of the man who had done this and the horror of the call they would receive. and i've been holding him and that family in my heart all day.
ReplyDeleteyes, let's remember 33... and so many more lives touched by those 33.
A great title for a brave, beautiful post, which invites us to live in the center of humanity, not on the edges, throwing stones.
ReplyDeleteBrava.
Amen. And thanks.
ReplyDeleteArt+