Columbine (Aquilegia) ~ Power and Gentleness in Suffering

People find God in the mountains.  Abraham ascended a mountain so he could hear the voice of God.  Moses ascended to see His face, and he came back down with his own face glowing like fire.  As for me, i climb to lose myself in the quietness, to hear the symphony of a trillion pine needles softly strumming the wind.

In the seasons when i am stateside, my aunt and i climb a different mountain every week.  She teaches me the names of wildflowers, and i tell her about my adventures.  Not long ago we summited Mount Audubon.  On the way up, as with any peak above 11,000 feet, we came to a great scree field.  It’s a desolate place above the tundra where only lichen grows.  There is no soil, only scorched rocks and slabs of granite.  It’s a place of howling winds and baking sun.  Yet something extraordinary had taken root there.  My aunt called me over to take a peek.  There, among the sterile landscape, grew the most exquisite columbine.  “Look at that!” she laughed, i could barely hear her over the roaring wind.  “What a miracle of life!”  And that’s exactly what it was.  A miracle of life.

For me, the Columbine flower has always represented a dichotomy. The genus name Aquilegia is derived from the Latin word for “eagle” (aquila), because the shape of the flower petals resemble an eagle's claw. Yet the common name ‘Columbine’ comes from the Latin for "dove" (columba), because the inverted flower resembles five doves clustered together.

An eagle and a dove.  Power and humility.  Bold and gentle.

When people find out i went to Columbine High School their expression usually changes.  Then slowly, timidly, the questions come.

“Were you there?” they whisper.

“What happened?  What did you see?  Did you know anybody who died?”

No, i was not physically in the building; and yes, i was affected.  i attended the school with students and faculty who had witnessed the first mass shooting in American history, and i learned a lot from them.  From time to time i stop by a grave to leave flowers, or to say a few words.

Our high school was surrounded by a strange environment after Hell came to visit.  Evil had scorched the landscape, the green was gone.  Fear set in, leaching the hearts of many.  Families had been shattered.  Depression often uprooted the hope trying to germinate.  People don’t hear about the continued activity of the trench coat mafia, of the subsequent shootings in Littleton after those initial ones.  They don’t hear about the students in my grade, years after the shooting, who committed suicide.  They never saw the teachers who struggled to keep it together when every day coming to work meant staring horrific memories in the face.

Yet, paradoxically, a new kind of life sprung up after the events of that day.  After Hell rose up to horrify us, Heaven came down to heal our wounds.  Through the baked rocks, hard and lifeless, something wholesome began to grow.  Pieces of broken people came together to form something new and beautiful and strong.  And while some teachers seemed broken beyond repair, others imbued a kind of strength that we the students couldn’t help but absorb.

People often came to our school, photographers and reporters and such.  We felt like zoo animals.  These reporters seemed aggravated that we were not as sad as they’d expected us to be.  Is it irreverent to move on?  Is it an evil to let go and be healed?  i will never understand how we ended up where we did, all i know is that i found myself surrounded by flowers where there should have been stone.

2 Timothy 1v7 says that God didn’t give us a spirit of fear, but one of power and love that produces a sound mind.  A Columbine flower is hard to define.  She has the prowess of an eagle, unshakable as the king of the skies.  Yet she is gentle and calm, pure as the peaceful dove.  

We can come out of our suffering absorbing the trauma of what happened.  We can adopt a spirit of fear.  But we don't have to.  God offers us another way.  Because of His paradoxical blessing, the blessing of the Columbine, we can live lives of power and gentleness.