remembering
“These are days you’ll remember.”
—from “These Are Days” by 10,000 Maniacs
For eight years, I served as a campus minister at a small independent Catholic girls school. Much of that work revolved around designing, organizing, and prepping students to lead liturgies and retreats. As busy as those projects made me, working on them really was pure joy for me. Professionally, they gave me opportunities to intersect every student in the school at some point, and, intellectually, they gave me opportunities to tap into my passion and geekery for ritual. Most importantly, though, personally, these experiences profoundly shaped me as an educator and as a person. Some might think that a peek behind the curtain might be disillusioning, but it only enhanced my own faith and engagement. My campus ministry colleagues and I were the ones behind the curtain, attending to the mechanics of the liturgy or the retreat to ensure things moved along smoothly, on schedule, and effectively. When all the pieces were in place, I could step out from behind the curtain and be present–to myself and my colleagues, to my students, to God’s presence–making the experience all the more meaningful for me. It was in those moments that I could see the connection between minutiae and mission–we worked hard to prepare for these experiences, and every detail contributed to the strengthening of our bonds as a community and to our capacities to know ourselves and to respond to our and others’ needs, or, as our mission articulated it, to make God’s love known in the world.
It’s hard to articulate how assiduously educators, campus ministers in particular, work to make their students and colleagues feel safe–safe enough to let their walls down for a moment, safe enough to feel connected to and be vulnerable with the people around them. In Catholicese, I’d say safe enough to be open to the work of the Holy Spirit. I didn’t do the work because I felt obligated to, and I didn’t want my students to feel obligated to any sort of prescriptive religious or spiritual behavior. Instead, I’d had my own profound experiences of God’s presence in liturgies and retreats before, and I hoped that my students might feel that comfort, that awe, that peace, or at least that this retreat or that liturgy would plant a seed that would grow and blossom into some spiritual nourishment or motivation they’d need or search for later.
On Wednesday, I woke up to the news of the shooting at Annunciation Catholic Church in Minneapolis. In one of the first reports I read, The New York Times quoted youth minister Ellie Mertens who was seated with students in the pews of the church when bullets shattered the windows of the sanctuary. “I was just feet away from this window,” she said. “The pew saved my life.” Later, as he told CBS news, her supervisor described it a little differently. Ellie, “who lays down her life every day for kids had to literally do it, holding kids’ hands, praying ‘Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, just keep them safe.’” The Times noted Mertens’ age–25. I couldn’t help but return to my first days as a campus minister at the same age. On the first day of school, which happened to be my 25th birthday, planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon, and southwestern Pennsylvania. For the rest of the day, I followed my seasoned colleagues’ lead in being present to students, making them feel safe, letting them worry or grieve or laugh, whatever they needed to do. Our own panic, our own grief, would wait, as all of our energies flowed toward making school a safe space for them. Over the course of several hours, I passed the front door of the school and watched the headmistress meet panicked parents, assure them their children were safe and better off with their friends than they would be at home just watching ongoing coverage. A few students went home with their parents because of family members in the towers, on the planes, or just missing, but the majority of parents trusted the school community to protect them.
It was a terrifying day on all levels, but we were hundreds of miles from New York City, and while thinking about Annunciation my imagination took me to dark places. I’d participated in and even run hundreds of emergency drills as an educator. At one school, my job during a lockdown drill included confirming that doors were locked, blinds were pulled, and students and staff were out of sight. An eerie echo followed the click of my heels in the silent hallway as I walked from room to room and tried each doorknob. Occasionally, I’d hear a gasp from inside when I rattled the door, and once, I entered a classroom with a broken lock to find a teacher and students huddled in a corner of the room with looks of terror on their faces. Even in a drill. I still feel pangs of guilt for inspiring such fear in students and colleagues through those exercises. As the emergency preparedness coordinator at my last school, I’d spent hours envisioning active shooters in the building trying to anticipate the paths they might take and vulnerabilities of the building. Those images I conjured were rooted in the myriad school shootings that have happened, and the recollections of survivors at other schools–I paid attention to primary and peripheral entrances, to escape options from every corner of the building. The one space that scared me most, the one in which the community felt most vulnerable, was our chapel. Sure, there were appropriate exits to quickly empty the space in case of a fire, but, what if…
I really wasn’t the right person for that role. I tried several times to tell my boss and colleagues that I was not the one to manage it–not because of my competence in the organizational aspects of the job but because of my own emotional fragility triggered by school shootings. I was in 6th grade when Laurie Dann killed one child and injured five others at a school in my hometown. As students, we were told something about an emergency, but the only thing I remember is that I wasn’t allowed to walk home from school, that I had to be signed out by a parent. One of my classmates’ parents kindly signed me out and dropped me off, and I promptly made a peanut butter sandwich and camped out in front of the television. The usual after-school lineup was replaced with local news’ live coverage of the shooting.
By that time, Dann had fled the school and entered the home of a family we knew, and until the news confirmed that she was still in that house, I kept looking out the window for signs that I should hide. She held them hostage for a while, and remained in the house after they reached safety, where she eventually shot herself. I was fixated on the screen, watching emergency vehicles block a street I knew well, watching a woman I recognized pacing, her hands on the sides of her head like she was simultaneously pulling out her hair and covering her ears, waiting for her son to emerge. He was 20 and had gotten the gun away from Dann long enough to let his mother and grandfather escape, but when police arrived Dann shot the 20 year old in the chest. I saw the alert that Phil had emerged, shot, and anxiously watched as a SWAT team waited for the green light to enter the home. That was 1988, and, first as a student, then as an educator, every news of a school shooting returned me to that screen and that feeling, a mix of fear, anxiety, and helplessness. Then as a teacher, news of any school shooting added devastating images of a disaster in my own school on top of that feeling, and, each time, I confronted the question, What would I do?
On Wednesday evening, “These Are Days” by 10,000 Maniacs played on my shuffle while I was scanning updates from Minneapolis. It’s a song I hadn’t listened to in years, maybe even decades.
These are days you’ll remember
Never before and never since,
I promise,
will the whole world be as warm as this
and as you feel it you’ll know it’s true
that you are blessed and lucky
It’s true that you
are touched by something
that will grow and bloom in you
Hearing Natalie Merchant’s voice transported me to a retreat center outside Boston where we’d bring the Ninth Grade for a mid-winter overnight retreat. Each grade level did at least one overnight retreat each year, and while prayer and reflection were at the core of the experience, our retreats weren’t “pious.” We were very consciously making space and providing opportunities for students to build connections with each other, and the retreat’s schedule included a rotation of activities that culminated in concluding liturgy. In one of these rotations, the class dean, Jillian, taught students simple choreography to “These Are Days.” Each small group practiced in a different corner of the chapel, and they all performed together as the closing song of the mass. As retreat director, I was able to float around, mostly to be able to help out as needed or to prepare for a later activity, but that also gave me the chance to observe groups in various settings. Jillian, the class dean, already had a particular gift for communicating the “how” and the “why” to students and colleagues, but as she showed students the steps and explained how all the different groups would eventually merge, she beamed and modeled joy. Every year, when the final performance of the number happened, the group was nearly ecstatic–by the end of the number, when the group formed a chain around the sanctuary, we saw students beaming with joy the way Jillian had while teaching the steps. It was fun, it was delightful, it was silly, but most importantly it gave every one of us a tangible sense of being part of something bigger than ourselves, of finding joy in that bigger something, and of knowing that we were all in it together.
I smiled broadly just thinking of that chapel, of Jillian working with small groups, of picturing the long and unbroken chain of students around the chapel, holding hands, singing along. And then I started weeping, because that lovely image was shattered by the thought of an attack in such a sacred space at such a sacred moment. I’m unfortunately all-too-familiar with happy memories being distorted this way. According to the K-12 School Shooting Database, there were 38 incidents in 1988, and until 2017 the annual number ranged between 15 and 60.
2018: 119.
2019: 124.
2020: 116.
2021: 257.
2022: 308.
2023: 350.
2024: 337.
And already in 2025: 149. With every incident, my happy memories of working in schools get darker and darker, marred by the intrusion of retrospective “what if” scenarios. I would imagine that there isn’t a person who works in a school right now who hasn’t been haunted by these possibilities, and I would imagine that I’m not the only one of my generation who has grown up with these nightmares.
But the shooting at Annunciation is hitting me differently. Could I ever have recovered and continued to serve my students and my school communities if a mass I’d planned, a chapel service I was coordinating, a retreat I was directing was so hideously interrupted? On an optimistic morning after my second cup of coffee, perhaps I’d say with confidence, Yes. But today, I’m not so sure.
The name of the parish comes from a poignant moment in the gospel according to Luke when Mary, the mother of Jesus, is visited by the angel Gabriel, God’s messenger.
And coming to her, [Gabriel] said, “Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you.” But she was greatly troubled at what was said and pondered what sort of greeting this might be. Then the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.”
The angel tells Mary she is pregnant and of the wondrous future of her child, but Mary resists at the ridiculousness of the news. She’d never had sex with a man, but Gabriel speaks of the mysterious work of God.
“The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”
Facing the power and mystery of the divine, Mary responded,
“Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.”
In short, this was Mary’s call to her ministry, to her vocation as the woman who would bring God’s loving presence into the world, and she said “yes.” The text of this gospel inspired one of the most commonly recited prayer for Mary’s intercession.
Hail Mary, full of grace!
The Lord is with you!
Blessed are you among women,
and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, mother of God,
pray for us, sinners,
now and at the hour of our death.
Nobody made it through second grade in Catholic school without memorizing the Ave Maria, the Hail Mary. The prayer invokes Gabriel’s words to praise Mary, a reminder to the one praying of her role in the life and ministry of Jesus, and then it pleads for Mary’s prayers. When I was 10, a priest explained that we don’t pray to Mary, only to God, but “Mary is God’s #1, so we ask her to put a good word in for us.” The phrase still rings in my head with Father McMahon’s slight Irish accent. And even thinking about that accent makes me giggle, because Father hadn’t grown up on the Emerald Isle but in Oak Park, Illinois. The older he got, the thicker his brogue. All that said, he had a way of distilling complex theological ideas into chewable bites, something I strived to emulate as a teacher many years later.
I’ve come to interpret the Annunciation story, the prayer it inspired, and the feast it celebrates (well, technically a “solemnity” in Catholicese, but whatever) as a reminder not just of Mary’s role in the life of Jesus but also as of Mary’s agency, of her decision to say “yes.” Catholics are reminded of stories about people saying “yes” frequently, from scriptural pericopes and origin stories of saints to singing “Here I am, Lord” over and over again while the communion line seems to take forever. It’s a not-so-subtle effort in reminding Catholics that we’re constantly being called to ministry–maybe not ordained or formal ministry, but when confronted with a decision, a conflict, or any other choice that impacts others, we have the option to make God’s love known in the world through our choices. At the start of the school year, Catholic schools gather to celebrate the Mass of the Holy Spirit to pray for the Spirit’s particular gifts–wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and faith–to fill us and to guide us, to enable us to make choices that invites God’s presence, peace, justice, and hope. Like Mary’s visit from Gabriel, that liturgy was both a proclamation that an invitation was waiting for each of us, and a reminder that, like Mary, each of us has a choice to say “yes” to the task ahead.
With each school shooting we revive debates about the Second Amendment and principles sacred to American democracy, but here we are, drowning in grief while fingers point and voices rage, trying to pigeonhole the blame, to use it to justify this or that idea or bias. I’m done with finger pointing and debating the Bill of Rights, because I just don’t have the will, I don’t have the energy. I will say this: my rage has turned into deep disappointment and a stinging sense of betrayal. Yeah, there’s a lot to be disappointed by right now, but my particular disappointment today is with Catholics. All Catholics? No. Just the ones who claim the banner of Catholic faith but fail to let it guide them in their work.
I feel betrayed by the families we served. I worked in institutions with many families who enjoyed extreme privilege and influence in the world because of their affluence or influence. We worked so hard to give your kids an experience of authentic community and the tools they need to develop their consciences, not just their career paths. And how did you vote? To support policies that protect teachers? To promote politicians and industries who benefit, by reelection or profit, the gun lobby? I can think of too many who screamed “pro-life” but failed to meaningfully uplift the dignity of marginalized and economically disenfranchised people. Some were elected or appointed in government office, but where is the Catholic Social Teaching extant in their work?
In fact, there’s one particular parent by whom I feel–and I hope we all feel–betrayed and whose shoulders should bear part of the responsibility for this ongoing nightmare of mass shootings: John Roberts. I met Justice Roberts briefly after his child enrolled in our school, and he praised our efforts toward social justice and faith development, but since then, I have searched to no avail for signs that his faith guided any of his votes and opinions, and his legacy will be rightfully tarnished if not shattered by the Supreme Court’s slow and steady erosion of gun restrictions under his watch.
I don’t want revenge. I want John Roberts to look every child in the eye, every child who was in that liturgy when bullets shattered their world. I want him to explain the Second Amendment to those children. I want him to explain why the Supreme Court he has led for 20 years has made AR-15s and other deadly weapons readily available. Maybe he could practice by explaining to his own daughter, now an adult, why his legacy could’ve enabled a person with a gun to kill her during the Mass of the Holy Spirit while we prayed together for the Spirit’s gifts. Maybe, looking in the face of children, in the face of his own child, Roberts might be moved to drop the discourse and shift to remorse and confess his sins to God’s innocents.
I want the same for every pro-life activist who has harassed and made life exponentially harder for women seeking appropriate medical care and facing impossible decisions, every one of those “Catholics” who bullied employees at medical clinics, who have voted for politicians because of their thin veneer of commitment to life as demonstrated by railing against abortion but never questioning access to deadly weapons, never questioning the policies that their preferred candidates implemented that maintain economic inequities and stoked animosity between marginalized groups, never questioning the callous reduction of services for poor families, of inhumane expectations to get food stamps, of punishing children for being born into poverty by halting livesaving school meal programs. I want these so-called “pro-life” warriors to look every educator at that school in the face, every administrator, teacher, admin assistant, campus minister, bus driver, and janitor at that school, every one of those adults who strived to create a safe and supportive learning environment and faith community for those children. I want them explain why some lives are more important than others.
If faith is a light, a source of life and protection, a beacon to follow to escape the darkness, as so many religious folx contend, then it’s time for them to actually follow that beacon instead of following their very human dictators, desires, and insecurities. Once upon a time I decried the idea that religious faith should impact politics and civics. That’s when I thought faith was actually guiding people. It’s clear to me now that it’s not faith–it’s greed and hatred and consumption, using the language of faith and the revelation of scripture to cobble together a glass fortress that protects a privileged few.
These are days we’ll remember, but not for their warmth or our recognition of being blessed and lucky. Something is growing and blooming in our children, but it’s not the hopeful future that Natalie sang about. Maybe, this time, a few more will recognize that people are more important than institutions and abstract principles and that it’s our turn to say “yes” to make God’s love known in the world.
