I was awoken by horrible news a few days ago that "Glee" star Mark Salling had committed suicide because of what we think was his 4-7 years sentence in prison. He was in possession of child pornography and pleaded guilty, and that is why he was sentenced to go to prison in March.

I was absolutely devasted to hear that he had to go in such an awful way, but apparently, everyone else did not feel the same way. I have seen thousands of tweets of people claiming that he deserved to die. I was appalled. Do we as a nation have no compassion or empathy? He was a human just like us. Don't we all deserve a second chance? The people bashing him also have no idea what else he was going through as well. I believe we should try to step into the shoes of other people and not be so self-centered.

Yes, I have great empathy for Mark Salling and no it is not because he was on one of my favorite television shows. I have empathy for him because he felt like he had to take his own life. I have empathy for him because he probably felt alone and ashamed. I have empathy for him because he felt that the only way to solve his hardships was to get rid of himself. I also have empathy for his family and friends that just lost a loved one.

If you claim to be a Christian then you believe that God forgives every one of their sins. It does not mean that what he did was okay, but it does mean that it is not okay to shame him and say that he deserved to die. We are imperfect human beings. We should be more forgiving and less judgemental on this matter.

Someone committing suicide should never be commemorated even if one believes it is a worthy cause. Instead, we should use this as a message that thousands of people are committing suicide every day. What can we do as a nation to stop this?