college campuses

Shootings ‘Hit Home’ at Local College, High School Campuses

By Gretchen R. Crowe
HERALD Staff Writer
(From the Issue of 4/26/07) george mason

FAIRFAX — Perhaps nowhere is the sting of last week’s shootings at Virginia Tech, which left 33 dead, felt more palpably than on college campuses throughout the commonwealth. “It could have been here,” people are saying. “It could have been us.”
No one can make sense of such a senseless act, and trying to make sense of it is beyond our understanding, said Father Peter Nasetta, Catholic campus minister at George Mason University in Fairfax.
“How can you make sense of what you can’t make sense of?” Father Nasetta asked in his homily at a Memorial Mass at St. Robert Bellarmine Chapel on Thursday. “Questions persist.”
But, he added, another senseless act was for God to take human form as His Son, to take on the world’s sufferings and ultimately to die to save humanity.
“Out of love for us, God chooses to become one of us and then die for us,” he said. “God’s love is mysterious. The way our God works is hard to understand.”
Catholics at George Mason gathered for the Mass to grieve together and pray together. Sounds of soft crying permeated the quiet atmosphere at the chapel, where some students donned ribbons and others simply hung their heads in sorrow. The students prayed for all those who were grieving; those who witnessed the attacks; those who have helped in their aftermath; for the grace to forgive the attacker; for the courage, wisdom and strength to continue to live in hope; and for, by name, all those who died, including the shooter.
“What our Christian faith tells us is that God is with us,” Father Nasetta said. “God is not absent when we suffer. God is not absent in the midst of horrific tragedies. He may be even closer.”
Andrew Hahn, a junior health science major, said the mood around George Mason’s campus following the shootings had been somber.
Hahn’s sister is a senior at Tech, but currently she is studying abroad. She’ll find a changed Virginia Tech community when she returns in May for graduation.
“You try not to reflect on it always, and like Father said, God brings good from all evil,” Hahn said. “It’s gonna take time.”
The evening Mass was followed by a university-wide vigil for the victims “to come together in unity,” Hahn said. “It amazed me how close to home it did hit and did affect the students here. It definitely brought the community together.”
“I never thought I’d see so many Virginia Tech signs and sweatshirts and banners on George Mason’s campus,” Father Nasetta added.
The shootings prompted a mixed reaction from the Catholic students at Mason, Father Nasetta said.
“It’s actually gotten harder as the week has gone on,” he said last Thursday. “It’s started coming home and the students start thinking it could happen here. Then they start hearing the names of the students and realize that they know them.”
Many Mason students went to grade school or were in church communities with the victims, he said.
A handful of students have sought one-on-one conversations with the campus minister, especially one student who lost one of her best friends.
Following Mass, students signed a large orange poster decorated with the logos of George Mason and Virginia Tech to send to the Blacksburg school, similar to the Wall of Remembrance that students signed at Marymount University in Arlington earlier in the week.
Marymount also held a campus-wide candlelight vigil on the campus quad Thursday night and collected donations for the fund to aid in the healing process.
Local high school communities, many of whose students graduate and go to Tech, were affected as well. Bishop O’Connell High School in Arlington renamed Friday “Virginia Tech Day,” where the students and faculty dressed in Virginia Tech colors, held an assembly and observed a moment of silence.
Joseph Samaha, father of 18-year-old Reema who was killed, was a 1973 graduate of O’Connell. Principal Dick Martin said a scholarship fund is being set up in her memory by another 1973 O’Connell grad, Kevin Fay. Contact the school at 703/237-1400 for more information.
The Paul VI Catholic High School community gathered for a Mass of Prayer and Healing on Thursday.
“You’ve all been touched deeply by this tragedy,” said Eileen Hanley, director of Student Life. “Everyone here either knows someone who goes to, has gone to or will be going to Virginia Tech in the future. I hope that you appreciate the special opportunity we all have as members of a Catholic school — that we can come together and share in our faith throughout difficult times like these.”
The PVI community also crafted and sent a spiritual bouquet to Virginia Tech president, Dr. Charles Steger. The arrangement was accompanied by a collection of prayers and personal wishes, in which students, faculty and administration members extended sympathies and support for the Virginia Tech community.
Seton School in Manassas will offer a Mass for the victims on April 27 and observed a moment of silence last Friday. Oakcrest School in McLean also observed Friday’s National Day of Mourning and offered that day’s Mass for the victims. Students and faculty from Oakcrest, Notre Dame Academy in Middleburg and Bishop Ireton High School in Alexandria wore orange and maroon. Ireton also celebrated a Memorial Mass on Wednesday evening, which was attended by graduates of the school who are currently enrolled at Tech.