As Senseless as it Gets



Hartford Courant photo of Sandy Hook service

The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting is about as senseless as senseless can get. After killing his mother at home the murderer travels to the school to deliberately target the kindergarten students.There is still a question as to his mother's connection to the school.

The more we hear about this horrific crime, the more incomprehensible it gets.  

Four trauma units were readied at Danbury hospital. Over 80 staff members waited for an expected influx of injured. Only a handful arrived. Most of the 28 fatalities (mostly children) had died at the scene.  

This all happened at a time when the parents of most early elementary school children worry more about challenges to their sons and daughters belief in Santa Claus, than their safety at school. Yet, less than two weeks before a Christian holiday that celebrates the birth of a Child, twenty Sandy Hook five-year-olds have been robbed of their lives. Their surviving schoolmates, stripped of their innocence.

The hurt will sting even more as the shock factor wears off and even as it begins to heal. As the feeling comes back we must start to try to make some sense of the senseless. Look deep into the most obvious causes of the tragic effects: troubled individuals, troubled families, troubled times and the too accessible means to act out one’s inner demons: guns. Ask ourselves how we can prevent mass killings of innocent lives, a crime that occurs more and more often.   

But for now, for this weekend, and through the weeks of this holy season that has turned to a mourning season for our nation, let us pray for the peaceful repose of the children and adults who lost their lives and for the comfort of those who loved them.