I was standing in the crowd at Staples Center in Los Angeles, watching Justin Bieber perform, when my friend and I got a text. It was our friend, who is studying abroad in Spain, saying, "Guys, I’m in Switzerland right now, but I’m safe. A little scared, but safe.” We both looked at each other wondering what the heck she was talking about. And when we opened up our Facebook apps, we realized that as we were sitting there watching Justin Bieber play his guitar, waving our hands, smiling, laughing, people were being murdered. They were sitting in a concert hall in Paris doing the exact same thing we were--enjoying music with friends. And suddenly they were gone. Slapped in the face by the world’s most cruel and terrifying reality.
But this happens every day. Violence is everywhere. You turn on the TV and someone got shot today. And we have become so used to this violence that we ignore it until it is tangible to us. We are shocked at a terrorist attack in Paris when it happens frequently in the Middle East. But this is because many of us have friends studying or living in Europe, more of us have stood under the Eiffel Tower and marveled at its beauty than have seen Baghdad with our own eyes. It is this tangibility that has made this tragedy in Paris bring awareness to what other countries continue to suffer from day in and day out. We remember the time we walked down cobblestone streets and ate macaroons in a café, and suddenly, we can put ourselves in those victims’ shoes, and realize how real it all is.
I will never forget the day I woke up for school in second grade and saw my mother sitting by the kitchen TV with her head in her hands. And I said, “Mommy what’s wrong?” and she looked at me with a sadness I had never seen before. Behind her, videos of planes crashing into buildings were being played over and over, and that was the first time I knew tragedy. How do you tell a second grader that we live in a world where innocent people are murdered by the hundreds, that this happens so often that many times we aren’t even aware it is happening?
No person can single-handedly save the world. We cannot stop this grim reality overnight, but what I learned in second grade and what still remains true is that we can pray. For those that are affected by realities that are both tangible to us, and tragedies that we may not even know are occurring. Prayer is the one thing that every person in the world can do for one another, to acknowledge another person’s suffering and hope that their suffering can be alleviated. And if the word prayer is uncomfortable for you, send the world your thoughts, your empathy, your compassion. Pray for the world. That’s all we can do.
