It is less that forty-eight hours since a lone shooter entered his local high school and massacred seventeen young people and teachers. Bang! We are knocked out of our routine to be reminded that there is evil in the world. I don’t think the shooter would have benefited much from medication or anger management classes. He wanted to silence the voices, gestures and movements of those whom he felt were more blessed than he was. He hated their full lives. Now, those victims will never run, or sing, or fly again. He will have final isolation.
Yesterday, in the early morning fog, I heard a cardinal singing and earlier in the week a chickadee whistled it’s simple two-notes. Unmistakable signs of Spring. The mornings are earlier and the sun sets a bit later each day. We have more light. The birds know what that means: nest-building, brooding, hatching and fledging. There is hope in the air.
A few years back, my community lost a young man to a heart attack. He was vibrant and looking forward to a new life with us as a servant in the Church. In silence several of us were walking up a side entrance to the building where the funeral luncheon was being held. The path was lined with bushes and evergreens. A cardinal at the top of a pine tree was singing loudly. Out of our silence, one of us looked up and said “the birds are still singing.” They are, aren’t they?