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 ight
years ago last Friday, this neighborhood was filled with the sounds of
sirens and screams. Helicopters circled relentlessly overhead. Inside
the high school children died. Some were perpetrators, some were
victims, but when it was over, the distinction hardly mattered. They
were all dead. Taken from life at a time when they were just beginning.
Those moments stand as an icon of horror, of helplessness, of raging
against a fate that has become a measurement of unfairness itself.
The pictures of that time still fill our minds. The barely alive, lanky
body falling out of the library window. The posters and flowers that
inundated Clement Park. The crosses on the hill, 13, then 15, then 13
again. TV images of children huddled, running, crying, confused,
overwhelmed. The parents with panic and consternation stamped on their
faces. The grinning visage of two damaged boys holding their guns like
trophy heads.
Some of you remember what followed here, in this building. Joel Miller’s
heroic response. The service on the Sunday following the killings. The
reaching out that went on and on. The frightened children of this
congregation. For those of you who were members and friends at the time,
I’m sure you remember it vividly. I know it is painful even now to
resurrect these memories.
It is not a choice today. Horror and loss have been thrust upon us
again. This time in Blacksburg, VA rather than Littleton, CO. This time
in a college rather than a high school. It makes no difference. They are
“our people” who suffer just as we were theirs when we suffered. We are
all Columbine. We are all Virginia Tech. We are all humans reeling from
violence and loss so senseless that is sends our minds searching for
answers that are not within the grasp of even the most wise. Why? Is on
the lips of everyone here and there. Why? We don’t know why.
Many use the language of mental health to encapsulate, to define why.
Cho was a loner. He frequently did not respond to a greeting. He wrote
plays filled with incredible violence. In the video tapes he mailed to
NBC he rants about rich kids and women, he compares himself to Jesus for
his death on the cross. As you watch the tape, he is alternately hostile
and matter of fact, in your face and seeming depressed. Considering his
evaluation in a mental health center and the comments of classmates and
teachers about his intensity, his loner mentality, and his violent
fantasies, he would seem easy to spot and easier to diagnose. But, I’m
not so sure.
There is a link that gives a clue to what I believe may explain what
happened in both places.
Cho connects himself to “martyrs like Eric and Dylan.” Like Eric and
Dylan, this massacre was planned, weapons stockpiled, rants against
those who had “harmed” them delivered, and the plan executed. Why?
Because they were “crazy”, mentally ill, psychotic?? Probably, to some
degree. But is that all there is? Is that the only way we can describe
Cho, and Eric and Dylan and every mass murderer in history. I don’t
believe so. I believe that the deaths which have ravaged 48 families and
two communities have to do with something that is harder to talk about,
harder to say. We have little common ground in this culture, especially
in our Unitarian Universalist culture to discuss evil and possession.
Evil persons are defined, in part, by psychiatrist and author M. Scott
Peck in People of the Lie as one who:
- Projects
his or her evils and sins onto others and tries to remove them from
others
- Is unable
to think from other people's viewpoints
- Realizes
the evil deep within themselves but are unable to tolerate the pain
of introspection or admit to themselves that they are evil.
Thus, they
constantly run away from their evil by putting themselves in a
position of moral superiority and putting the locus of evil on
others.
We do not have the language today to describe this behavior in our
religious tradition because we left religious definitions of
contemporary behavior well behind us. We threw them out to make way for
the burgeoning language of Freud and modern psychology. We are, in fact,
repelled by the fundamentalists who continue to use “the devil” as a
strong motivator to frighten church members in to following the straight
and narrow road of life. Many of us here do not believe in hell, or
heaven. So how can we believe in the presence of evil in the world? That
is, how can we believe in evil which is endemic, a part of the human
make up, placed there in our original design? We know some of the causes
of the darkness, the spiritual void, of the infamous, like Adolph
Hitler. These three must have experienced a similar darkness, a similar
profound emptiness in their souls.
I was standing in the open window of my 2nd story home office yesterday,
vacantly staring out. I was feeling sad and helpless as I thought about
what we are discussing. Then a voice got my attention. On the street in
front of our house, an adolescent boy, maybe 15 or so, was standing by
his bicycle uttering non-stop obscenities at an unseen source of his
upset. He used such foul words with such intensity for such a long time
that it truly had my attention. I wondered what had inspired such wrath,
such entitlement. I leaned to see the source of such difficulty for him.
An aged, sad looking golden retriever came slowly toddling into view.
She wasn’t going fast enough for his majesty, so he had descended into
narcissistic rage. As he spit out the last word, “bitch,” at the old dog,
I thought, “Ah. Cho, and Eric and Dylan in training.”
We have helped train our young in this country’s culture to be
potentially destructive. Narcissism run amok. It is a time of ME-ness.
Which opens the door to violence. As our wealth has grown and access to
toys has become manifest in the world of the young, there has been a
precipitous decline in altruism. With primitive music of hate, violence
and misogyny booming in iPod fed ears, it should not be a surprise that
less and less teens are practicing regular acts of kindness and
compassion. There are many wonderful exceptions, of course, but the
trend is absolutely clear. Further consider the emotional/spiritual
damage done through access to video games playing out endless varieties
of cyber violence. Have you played video games where the goal is to
horribly kill as many as you can? TV programs and movies that now leave
nothing to the imagination in the way of killing, impaling, beheading,
and other forms of horrible mayhem feed the quotient for violence in
those who, like Cho and Eric and Dylan, are most susceptible.
BUT, they are victims too. It is difficult to demonize them when a true
picture is drawn. First we learned that Cho was an autistic child. Then,
on Friday, Cho’s family issued a statement that spoke for all of us. The
statement was an incredible gift of love issued out of the heart of
darkness.
"We are humbled by this darkness. We feel hopeless, helpless and lost.
My brother has made the world weep. We are living a nightmare.”
"We pray for their families and loved ones who are experiencing so much
excruciating grief. And we pray for those who were injured and for those
whose lives are changed forever because of what they witnessed and
experienced," said Sun-Kyung Cho.
"Each of these people had so much love, talent and gifts to offer, and
their lives were cut short by a horrible and senseless act. Our family
is so very sorry for my brother’s unspeakable actions. It is a terrible
tragedy for all of us.”
America has become a violent society. Viet Nam and Iraq. The
unimaginable number of gun related deaths each year in the country.
Has anybody here seen my old friends Martin, Bobby, and John. Can you
tell me where they’ve gone?
We are, in a very real way, in a spiritual crisis. How can we continue
to kill others, and our own young men and women, in wars that make no
sense and keep our spiritual center? How can we deal with the abhorrent
acts at Columbine and Virginia Tech, without admitting that something is
terribly wrong with our society! That we have lost our way.
“Don’t overreact,” I can hear some of you saying. “These were acts
committed by three out of millions. They are not representative of
anything other than themselves. It was their doing, their twisted acts,
period. To make more out of it is to just stir the pot. Let’s get on
with the regular life that the great majority of us live.” I have heard
those very words here, at Columbine UU, where we are next door to one of
these unspeakable tragedies. I do not agree. Our denial may be a part of
the problem. But that is for a future sermon.
Now we need to return our focus to the grief being experienced in
Blacksburg, and here in Littleton, from processing of the mind, to
opening our hearts.
As some of you know, I contacted our sister church, the UU congregation
of Blacksburg on Tuesday, and offered assistance. Then, as I talked with
others here, the idea of a symbolic gift to offer them seemed deeply
important. I called a Blacksburg nursery and arranged for a flowering
dogwood tree to be planted on the grounds of their church. I sent to
following message to accompany the tree:
To our
Unitarian Universalist brothers and sisters in Blacksburg:
Today we
arranged for a flowering dogwood tree to be planted at your church
as a gift, a tiny token, from us in your hour of grief. Each spring,
when it blooms anew, please remember the 33 souls who were taken in
your world, and the 15 who were taken in ours. We share membership
in a fellowship of suffering that I wish we did not.
Please
remember that you are in our prayers. We have walked this terrible
road before. We understand.
If there
is anything that we can do for you, anything, please let us know.
With love
and blessings to all who have been harmed.
For the
congregation of Columbine Unitarian Universalist Church in
Littleton, CO
Rev.
Barry Bloom, Minister
Karen
Cody-Hopkins, President of the congregation
We were responded to with gratitude. Here is the note sent back from the
Blacksburg church.
“Thank
you so very much for your kind words and for the wonderful gift that
you are sending to us. We have received so much support from the
wider UU community including a message from Bill Sinkford and
several from your congregation. As our minister is on sabbatical, a
minister from 3 hours away, Rev. Jeanne Pupke, and our district
administrator, Annette Marquis, were here within hours. The UUA is
sending ministers who specialize in grief counseling for our Sunday
service. We are truly blessed to be part of a community of caring
souls. We grieved when you suffered tragedy and now we ourselves are
in such pain. Each spring your tree will remind us of the beauty of
life and we will remember both your loss and ours. Thank you again.”
Lisa
Evanylo, Administrator
Brooks Brown was a Columbine HS student who was a friend of Eric Harris.
When Eric and Dylan were walking in to the school with their guns and
bombs Eric told Brooks that he liked him and for him to go home, thus
saving his life. Brooks is now 26. He delivered a thoughtful essay on
National Public Radio on Wednesday. In it he tried to convey the lessons
that the victims of the Columbine tragedy had learned by doing what they
have done to recover from their losses, to the families, the current
victims in Blacksburg. He said, in effect (paraphrasing):
Do whatever seems right for you to do. But I can tell you that those of
us who came out of isolation, who cried together, who held each other,
who didn’t hide our grief, that we have recovered faster than those who
have continued to isolate, who remain bitter, angry, frozen. When you
see that student with wet eyes sitting alone under a tree in Blacksburg,
don’t leave him alone. Go hug him. It might save more lives.
I invite you to enter into a time of quiet together. During the quiet, I
invite you to feel whatever is stirring inside. I especially open this
to be a time of mourning. For the death of innocence in our town, in
theirs, and in the world. And for the literal deaths of 48 souls who
died far too soon.
If there are tears, they are welcome. There are boxes of Kleenex around
the sanctuary.
(After completion of the time of mourning) … Let us share
in words for a few moments. Let us share our hearts with each other.
(After
completion of community sharing) ...
The death of the innocence of our children troubles me almost as much as
the shootings themselves. They are inseparable in my mind. As I see my
13 year old daughter inundated with images of violence and cynicism, see
the dearth of respectful, caring behavior among adolescents, and watch
playfulness and joy disappear from their lives, I see the potential for
more Chos, more Erics and Dylans to step into the next school down the
street on some bright, warm April day and open fire.
I don’t pretend to know what the genesis of evil is. What I do know is
that our explanations for the cause of these killings are not complete.
A mental health diagnosis does not reflect the spiritual depth of the
darkness, the existential crises that are at play. We must change how we
see and how we respond in the future, so that my daughter’s generation
does not need to violently lose innocent children on the floor of once
safe classrooms.
The Denver Post, on the day after the killings at Columbine eight years
ago, wrote an editorial of which they repeated a part the day after the
killings at Virginia Tech.
“We must
commit ourselves to a new determination to nurture each other, and
the children committed to our care, in ways more meaningful than we
have ever known before."
In the darkness, here is the hope. To nurture each other and the
children committed to our care in more meaningful ways. To act with
deeper love to offset the presence of evil. To act with compassion,
kindness, and care. To forgive all who have harmed US so that we,
ourselves, do not act in anger toward others. To open our hearts to each
other and the holy that fills all of life, even in the midst of terrible
violence and loss, if we but open our eyes to see.
We must. We are Columbine. We are Virginia Tech.
Amen.
Re-member
us,
You who are living,
Restore us, renew us.
Speak for our silence.
Continue our work.
Bless the breath of life.
Sing of the hidden patterns.
Weave the web of peace.
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