It may just be me, but I feel the news of this past week’s tragedy had an effect on the student body at West Chester, perhaps even the nation. I know a few people who come from the city where the Amish school shooting took place, which was practically at our doorstep. What grieves me the most, though, is the fact that my first reaction was that I did not care.I am not surprised that I didn’t care. I didn’t know how to react to the attack on the World Trade Center either, and although I was younger, I didn’t really feel the significance of the Columbine school shootings. However, I now realize that this was not because I was young and I didn’t care. I am about to graduate college and I still do not know how to react to a tragedy such as this.
For most of my life I didn’t relate to the Amish. They lived about an hour away, but it was like another universe. Once I got so far down Rt. 30, it became another world. When I heard about the shootings, I didn’t know what to think. Yes, these people are my neighbors, but I regret to say that I never cared too much about what went on in their world. This act especially seemed so random.
There was no one to blame, nothing to protest. This didn’t reveal any large social issues that I could think of. It was just meaningless and I did not want to hear about it. Finally, after a couple days lost in the fog of emotion that follows something like this, someone told me that the families forgave their children’s murderer. After knowing I was supposed to feel something, but couldn’t feel anything- this was it, the sun finally came out.
The story I heard now was completely different that of just two days ago. Instead of people being sad because a milkman snapped and took out innocent life along with his own, I heard about people superhumanly turning the other cheek and reaching out to the wife and family of the man, helping them also cope with their loss. I’m not going to lie; I got a bit choked up.
Maybe as a nation we will learn something from this. What would our country be like today if this was our reaction after 9/11? I think the Amish upstaged the U.S. government; it makes the rest of us feel pretty small.
This hits me personally because I see how quickly I am to blame instead of forgive. Jesus Christ said in order to be forgiven we must forgive, and I know my first reaction is not to “turn the other cheek.”
I thank God for another day to be alive, and for the lesson the Amish just showed our country. I hope I am able to apply this lesson, and I hope we, as a nation, will respect this incredible act of forgiveness, and start showing grace on those who have wronged us.
Sean Deminski is a student at West Chester University.