The summer before I entered eighth grade, my cousin died in a car accident. He was a month away from turning 18. The word “tragedy” doesn’t even begin to cover it. I remember that night turning on the 10 o’clock news and seeing his face on the screen, with the newscasters speaking in official-sounding and sympathetic voices about the promising young man whose life had ended too soon. I had seen reports like this before, you see, but I had never put much thought into them. A flickering “that’s so sad” would dance through my mind before that night whenever there was a report of a casualty on the news and I’d forget it the next day. Until it happened to me. I can tell you that now every time I watch the local news and hear of someone’s passing, I take a moment more to think about the victim. I take a moment more to be sad. Not because they were famous or because they touched my life in any sort of way. But they touched someone’s life. For we will be mourned most by those who knew us best. They might’ve been someone’s “somebody.” They are God’s, most definitely. And that alone makes their departure from this world a tragedy.
In light of last week’s events I encourage us all to have that moment. Don’t let this be a flickering feeling of passive sympathy. Let yourself feel it. The injustice of it. The horror of it. And ultimately, the humanity of it. The humanity of the hurt and the pain and the wanting for there to be change and healing. Be empathetic instead of sympathetic. By no means do I think we should be dishonoring those directly affected by making the tragic events in Orlando about ourselves and our feelings. Because it’s not about me or you. It’s about those who directly suffered and died and are still suffering. So we shouldn’t make this about our feelings, but we should feel. There are so many important things to be said on this topic and many more posts on this site and others that are so much more eloquent and provocative and personal. But I really felt called to write this for this week. Not necessarily to spark a discussion or a debate. I don’t want to get into arguments. Not now. I want this to be an encouragement to think about the fragility of life. I want you to think about what it would be like if this had happened in your town, to one of your friends or family, or even you. Let’s just please start there. We don’t know what’s coming next. So often do we forget that there is so much in this world that we don’t think will happen, until it happens to us. This is happening. This has happened. Let’s not forget it.
