School shooting, from a teacher's perspective..

This blog is being posted in response to listening to a teacher call into the KLove Christian Radio show this morning, describing the conversations that she had with her Elementary Students following the tragedy in Newton, CT on December 14.

I paraphrase, but one of the kids asked her "Do you love us like their teacher loved them?" Im assuming the student was referencing Victoria Soto, who (as the story goes) hid her children in cabinets, cloets, etc, and then told the gunman that "The kids are all in the gym" before being killed.

As a teacher, I had a conversation with another teacher along the lines of "Would you be willing to do that? Would you be willing to stand face-to-face with a gunman, know you're about to be killed, in hopes of saving your students"...

The teacher's response was "Probably not. Im not going to die for a student who wouldn't die for me". At first, that seemed a bit harsh, but the more I thought about it, the teacher was just being honest, expressed an opinion. For the past 2 days Ive caught myself asking the very same question.. "Would I be willing to die for these kids?"

These events hit me extremely hard. I openly tell people that I am a very emotional person. When it comes to children, I will cry at the drop of a hat. But this tragedy really struck a chord with me. My oldest daughter is in Kindergarten, and my wife is a 1st grade teacher. As soon as I heard the news of what happened, my thoughts immediately turned to them. It was 2 days before I returned home to see them, but couldn't wait to hug them.

Last Friday, a student from the High School I teach at texted me, and asked "Can we have a Prayer Circle Monday morning before school?" We ended up with 50 or so people, including teachers and students. The hardest part of this prayer time was reading the names and ages of the victims of the massacre. As I read them, I could hear students begin to weep quietly. The more names I read with the age of "6", I really got choked up...

I would be lying if I haven't thought about the parallels of Soto story to the one of Christ, how he died to allow others to live. I know that there is a REALLY good chance that some people will read this, and have no belief in God, in Christianity, and that is 100% fine. For me, though, my own personal beliefs is God have really resonated through this shooting, begging the question once again "Would I be able to do that?". I honestly don't know. The easy answer would be YES!! Would I die for my daughters or wife? ABSOLUTELY!!! Would I die for my students? I honestly just don't know. Until I have to be face-to-face and make the decision (hopefully that will never happen), I just can't be certain.

I don't really have a point to this blog, This is more along the lines of therapy for me, just wanting to jot down some things that are on my mind.  As I said earlier, this shooting has really affected me, and I just wanted to put some things down in words. I really hope you guys have a great day.