Tragedy in Virginia

By now you've probably heard about the awful tragedy at Virginia Tech, where more than 30 people are dead after a shooter went on a rampage. My brother is a PhD student at V-Tech and works in a building very close to the one where the second shooting occurred. He lives less than a quarter mile away from where he works. Don't worry; he is fine, and got the email that the campus was shut down before he went to work this morning. Despite the tragic news coming out of places like Iraq on a nearly daily basis, it always makes me feel newly and rawly horrified to hear about such an incident on American soil. How could a person be so senseless, so brutal? Why were automatic weapons (the gunman had several) accessible to a person capable of such an act? So far, nothing is known about the man who committed this crime, as he is dead himself and carried no identification.

We mourn the loss of these people who did nothing more than show up to class or work on time. We mourn whatever it is in this young man's life and psyche that pushed him to turn a college campus into a war zone. We mourn a society and culture in which such a thing is possible.

Dear readers, when you pray or meditate or do whatever it is you do (if you do), please remember this day. Let us hope it never happens again.