Lasting Values for Life from VA Tech Horror

In a moving, very moving, ceremony at Virginia Tech, students gathered and in an evening candlelight service had a moment of silence. Silence; in tribute to their friends, and loved ones, and fellow "Hokies," who lost their lives, or were injured, in the senseless violence April 16. "Gov. Timothy M. Kaine declared Friday a day of mourning and called for a moment of silence at noon to honor the 32 victims in Monday's massacre at Virginia Tech. Churches around the country, from California to National Cathedral in Washington D.C., have scheduled vigils and special prayer services." [MSNBC]

What do we take away from such horror? We can let it begin to rule our hearts, as often frightful things can. For many years after 9/11 people who were close to the ones who lost their life in that senseless attack, would find themselves weeping uncontrollably for no apparent reason. The fright takes over their emotional life and their control is gone. Such fright is deep, goes into a center of a person that resides in the thoughts and emotions in such a way that a person may not even be aware of it. Many aren't and the result is a life shoved into neutral- no longer capable of going forward.

What do we take away from such horror? We can react to it in anger, turn hateful hearts and thoughts toward those who are perpetrators of this, to the person or persons who make this horror, and their families. We can react in such a way, and many choose to thing such violent thoughts, angry, spiteful thoughts. In the aftermath of 9/11 many people reacted in deep anger against any mention of the attack. Often these people would find themselves wanting to strike back and not knowing against whom, without a target they let the bile of hatred expand within their soul like leaven in a loaf of bread.

What do we take away from such horror? What if we make the event a marker for better in our lives? What if we realize, stop and deliberately realize that life is not what we think, we don't know when it will end; not one of the people who died in that horrible attack got up that morning knowing they would. "Our culpability in this situation, as a society, has been mischaracterized. Where we fell down was not in our lack of coddling this idiot or some misstep in guiding his defective and deviant urges towards more constructive ends. We are a society based on self-sufficiency, and those who are not self-sufficient are intrinsically barred from being full members of our society. Where we fell down was not Cho. We fell down with everyone else in that classroom. We taught them to be cowards, and then told them it was good that they were." --MattyfromCincinnatti [MSNBC] What Matty states can only be said by a person who was there, for anyone else, it would be wrong, but coming from someone involved on the inside of the horror- she clearly says it, "we fell down."

We fell down, but we won't stay there, we aren't the sort of people who will stay there, and when it's all over, we will be standing, head held high, because we are the home of the free, and the land of the brave. Don't you dare let a maniac rob you of that.