Amish response to tragedy is lesson in faith, forgiveness

Last October, every parent's worst nightmare played out in a one-room Amish schoolhouse in rural Pennsylvania.

Charles Carl Roberts IV barricaded himself in the schoolhouse and killed five little girls execution style before killing himself. Five other girls were bound and critically wounded. The last of the wounded was released from the hospital shortly before Christmas.

The Amish community responded in a way very foreign to modern sensibilities. There was no making the rounds of the morning talk shows or newspaper interviews. They turned to God for solace and to one another for support. They were not angry. Because of their deep, abiding faith, they took comfort in the knowledge that their daughters were in a better place. Their more immediate concern was reaching out to Roberts' widow.

When the financial contributions poured into the community, a decision was made to contribute to a fund for Robert's widow and her three children. They, too, the Amish community reasoned, were a victims of this senseless violence.

What uncommon grace.

As we look back on 2006, there was perhaps no better teaching moment than this episode. When violence and unchecked anger contaminated their world, the Amish responded in a way, I dare say, that few of us would. They embraced the Roberts family. And they forgave Roberts. Can you imagine?

Obviously, it is better to forgive than to fester in the cesspool of anger and hatred. But to come to that place immediately? It's unthinkable to most of us.

When I think of children in our own community who were brutalized and slain this past year, my first instinct isn't forgiveness. I want the culprits to pay dearly for their depraved actions. I want justice for the victims and their families. I want these people locked up for a long time so they cannot hurt another child.

It's terrifying to me that we live in the same communities as men and women who have the capacity to kill a child, theirs or a stranger's. Why do they act out this way? What can be done to change their hearts?

We have a lot to learn from the Amish in this respect. Lashing out in anger or hatred was not an option for them, even when their children had been brutally murdered. They responded with compassion.

In recent days, Gary Ceran, whose wife and two children were killed on Christmas Eve by an alleged drunken driver, expressed his concern for the accused, Carlos Prieto. "He'll experience the grief far more than mine, because I don't have to deal with being the cause of it," Ceran told KSL-TV.