It is my faith that God is there in Blacksburg, Virginia, in those bloodied halls among the shattered desks and with the shattered bodies and spirits. But so is evil. Pain, separation and loss are the very definition of evil. Such carnage cannot be justified for any reason and such is completely contrary to God’s will for human community.

We don’t talk all that much about God’s grief at a spasm of human violence that destroys all that it touches. I cannot help but believe, however, that God weeps at all such loss and grieves that any one of God’s precious children is harmed in such a hideous way.

There are those in the Christian faith who will say of any tragedy that it is still “part of God’s plan.” Such a theology does not respect how far senseless violence is from God and it does not let people fully grieve, let alone acknowledge the grief of God at stupid, senseless loss. This isn’t God’s plan—this is sin, this is evil, this is turning away from everything that God wills for human flourishing.

It is to the Psalms that I turn in the face of overwhelming tragedy and underwhelming, superficial theologies. The Psalms plumb the depths of the human encounter with pain, separation and loss and the inexplicable nature of human suffering. “Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help.” (Psalm 22)