Commentary: What we can say in wake of Virginia Tech tragedy
Apr. 24, 2007
NOTE: This commentary by the pastor of Blacksburg (Va.) United Methodist Church was delivered as a sermon on April 22, the first Sunday after 33 people died in a shooting rampage on the Blacksburg campus of Virginia Tech University. It is based on 2 Corinthians 4:7-10.
A UMNS Commentary By the Rev. Reginald Tuck
At the service for shooting victim Austin Cloyd yesterday, I shared with the congregation that her mother, Renee, was here at the church when we first heard reports that there had been a shooting at Virginia Tech.
Renee and I were discussing the Clayton Estates ministry at about the time that students in Norris Hall, including Austin, were being subjected to terror that we could never have thought possible in this town. Renee has been the coordinator for our Thursday group that ministers to middle and high school students. She was here to make certain that someone had signed up for the dinner and, sure enough, it was the students from The Wesley Foundation, our United Methodist campus ministry, who had taken responsibility this past week. When we were told that there had been a shooting at the campus, we didn't realize that people had been killed. We were concerned, but we could never have imagined the news that would come just hours later.
As all of us listened to the news reports on Monday, it seemed unbelievable and it still seems unbelievable today. As we have learned of the deaths and wounding of so many people, we have found ourselves in a state of great shock and disbelief. We cannot fully comprehend what has happened and we will never understand it. We do understand our heartbreak and pain and frustration, and many of us find ourselves struggling to know how to think, much less speak about our Christian faith.
Paul's words to the Corinthians can help us to understand that our struggle is understandable and more importantly, faithful! Paul wrote, "we have this treasure (that is, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ) in clay jars, so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed."
Christian faith does not take away the pain, but helps us to find a way through the pain without being destroyed. Christian faith does not give us all the answers, but helps us to not be undone by the questions. Christian faith is not about taking away all our problems, but giving us the strength to persevere in the midst of our problems. A savior who was willing to endure the brutality of a crucifixion is indeed one who can speak to the depth of the pain that we have experienced and continue to experience. We can trust that God understands our broken hearts because God's heart was broken on Good Friday and broken again on a Monday that became our Good Friday. As we struggle in all faithfulness with our affliction, perplexity, persecution and having been struck down, our faith assures us that it cannot destroy us because we know the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. It is to say that because of what God has done in Jesus Christ, we can do all things, knowing that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us.
Christian faith helps us to wrestle honestly with our struggles. I like how Paul's words are not theological clichés designed to give us easy answers, but rather acknowledge the complexities of life in the assurance that they need not destroy our faith; that indeed faith is what persists in the midst of the complexities.
When we experienced the deaths of two law enforcement officers last year, I returned to an article of a lecture that was written soon after the destruction of the twin towers at the World Trade Center. William Stacy Johnson, a professor of theology at Princeton Theological Seminary, gave a lecture titled "Probing the 'Meaning' of September 11, 2001." It has application for April 16, 2007. Johnson observed, "As soon as the dust had settled from the destruction of September 11, people began pouring into houses of worship asking, 'Where was God?' Some of the answers given to this question were themselves highly questionable."
Johnson cited the work of Maurice Blanchot who wrestled with the question of how one is to put into words the 'meaning' of catastrophic events. Johnson related that Blanchot wrote, "If the disaster could be said to have a 'meaning,' that would be the worst thing of all. The worst kind of 'wisdom' would be the kind that domesticates the devastation or seeks to explain it. By explaining events, we seek nothing more than to explain them away. To assign catastrophe a 'meaning' is to do no more than prescribe an anodyne; for in a way, an explanation is a certain kind of escape."
As we experience the catastrophe of April 16, 2007, I want to suggest that attempting to assign a 'meaning' may be the most meaningless thing we can do. It will be much more faithful to live in the ambiguity -- the frustration, the pain -- because that is where God's power can be experienced and given its most meaningful expression. Christian faith encompasses both Easter and Good Friday, and we truncate our faith if we minimize or neglect either one. It creates an uneasy tension, this message of great anguish and great hope, but anything else rings hollow and cannot speak to the complexity of our lives.
As we seek to live into and with this uneasy tension of anguish and hope, I think it is important to consider some fundamental teachings of our faith. Our faith teaches us that what has happened this past week is contrary to God's intentions for human life. The events of this past week frustrate the plans that God has for us, but it does not frustrate God's plan for us to know and experience redemption in our lives.
In that light as we place our trust in God, I want to offer four thoughts for our consideration as we struggle with what we have experienced and as we try to live into the coming days.
First, I want to suggest that it is a time to acknowledge our pain and not assign blame. Blame is a way of avoiding pain, but it proves to be an empty antidote. I heard Dr. Phil say that you cannot make sense of nonsense and no amount of blame is going to make sense of what has happened. Yes, we will need to carefully consider what has happened so that we learn whatever lessons this horrible tragedy has to teach us, but no amount of blame is going to take away our pain. So it seems to me that the first order of business is to acknowledge the pain because it is something that we all share and it can be the foundation on which to move forward. So let us focus more on acknowledging our pain rather than assigning blame.
Second, I want to suggest that it is a time to affirm our larger oneness and not be divided by dumbness. As people attempt to explain or give meaning, there is the danger that explanations become the basis of more pain and injustice. While it is obvious that the killer must have been suffering with mental illness, it should be equally obvious that the overwhelming majority of people who struggle with mental illness never resort to such expressions of hostility.
We also need to be aware of the pain experienced by people in the Korean community, and I trust that we recognize that such acts transcend ethnicity and unfortunately a potentiality in all of us. We had a service here yesterday morning in which people of all ethnicities gathered to share our pain. We need to embrace one another in the coming days to affirm our larger oneness and not be divided by dumbness.
Third, I want to suggest that it is a time to be kind and to keep our minds. My dear friend Beany Butt who died on Wednesday carried this saying in his wallet: "It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice." When Immaculee Ilibagiza, a survivor of the Rwandan Holocaust, was here with us in September, she challenged us to always choose kindness. She said if we had to choose between the truth or kindness, to always choose kindness. Her capacity to forgive the killers of her family is credibility enough for me.
As we struggle with people who are quick to judge, assign blame and divide us, even though we may know the truth, let us resolve to be kind and to keep our minds. We have all sorts of people descending upon us, in particular, religious groups. And while it is unlikely that we will change their claims about the truth, let us resolve to not allow them to cause us to act in ways that we will regret.
In a stewardship campaign DVD I was telling Renee Cloyd about on April 16, as her daughter was entering into eternal life, a young girl who is a part of our program at Clayton Estates comments, "we have trouble with each other being around and we try not to say anything at tutoring. But sometimes it just slips out and Renee, one of our loyal tutors, helps us understand that we can't be rude to each other and we have become friends and therefore I think God helps us with that." Let us understand that it is a time to be kind and to keep our minds.
Finally, I want to suggest that it is a time to renew our trust in what God can do and believe that God will get us through. This is the hope that we find in Paul's words about his perplexity. It was not his own strength, but God's strength that helped him to not be crushed, to not be driven to despair, to not feel forsaken, to not be destroyed.
Dr. Nikki Giovanni gave voice to this teaching of our faith this past week in Hokie language. Let me translate it into Christian language. We are the people of Jesus Christ. We are sad today, and we will be sad for quite a while. We are not moving on; we are embracing our mourning. We are the people of Jesus Christ. We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly, we are brave enough to bend to cry, and we are sad enough to know that we must laugh again. We are the people of Jesus Christ.
We do not understand this tragedy. We know we did nothing to deserve it, but neither does a child in Africa dying of AIDS, neither do the invisible children walking the night away to avoid being captured by the rogue army, neither does the baby elephant watching his community being devastated for ivory, neither does the Mexican child looking for fresh water, neither does the Appalachian infant killed in the middle of the night in his crib in the home his father built with his own hands being run over by a boulder because the land was destabilized. No one deserves a tragedy.
We are the people of Jesus Christ. The church embraces our own and reaches out with open heart and hands to those who offer their hearts and minds. We are strong, and brave, and innocent and unafraid. We are better than we think and not quite what we want to be. We are alive to the imaginations and possibilities. We will continue to live into the kingdom of God through our blood and tears and through all our sadness. We are the people of Jesus Christ. We will prevail. We will prevail. We will prevail. We are the people of Jesus Christ.
I received a copy of an e-mail that Bryan Cloyd sent to his class after Austin's death was confirmed. He wrote: "My family's worst fears were confirmed a few hours ago. My daughter was one of the victims in Norris Hall. She would have been 19 years old next Tuesday. My family hurts deeply for the loss of our precious baby. We ask that you pray for us and for the rest of the Virginia Tech community that has suffered so greatly. At this point, I don't know how or where our class will continue. ... If we don't meet again, your final assignment from me is perhaps the most important lesson you will learn in life. Go to your mother, father, brothers and sisters and tell them with all your heart how much you love them. And tell them that you know how much they love you, too. Go out of your way to make good memories. At some point, these memories may be all you have left. May God bless you all."
Now I ask you, from where does such strength come?
News media contact: Marta Aldrich, Nashville, Tenn. (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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